Thickness dependence of crystalline structure of Al-doped ZnO thin films deposited by spray pyrolysis

GARCÉS, F.; BUDINI, N.; ARCE, R. D.; SCHMIDT, J. A.

Santa Fe

Congreso; CONGRESO INTERNACIONAL DE METALURGIA Y MATERIALES SAM-CONAMET/IBEROMAT/MATERIA 2014; 2014

Sociedad Argentina de Materiales

In this work, we have investigated the influence of thickness on crystalline structure of Al-doped ZnO films. Transparent conductingoxide films were grown by the spray pyrolysis technique from precursors prepared via the sol-gel method. We determined thestructural properties of the films by performing X-ray diffraction and mosaicity measurements, which evidenced an increase ofdisorder and inhomogeneity between crystalline domains as the films thickened. This behavior was attributed to plastic deformationof the films as their thickness increased. Disorder is usually caused by internal stress in the crystalline structure of the film, whichis due to diverse factors such as lattice and thermal mismatches between substrate and sample, postdeposition heat treatments,film growth parameters, film thickness, etc. Although there are several reports concerning stress-induced optical and electricalfluctuations of ZnO films, due to annealing or deposition processes, different substrates types and doping, the thickness dependenceof structural characteristics is scarcely reported.