AVS 53rd International Symposium
    Thin Film Tuesday Sessions
       Session TF-TuM

Paper TF-TuM12
Sputter Deposition of Al Doped ZnO Films with Various Incident Angles

Tuesday, November 14, 2006, 11:40 am, Room 2022

Session: Materials for Flexible Substrates, Displays, and Optoelectronics
Presenter: Y. Sato, Aoyama Gakuin University, Japan
Authors: Y. Sato, Aoyama Gakuin University, Japan
K. Yanagisawa, Aoyama Gakuin University, Japan
A. Miyamura, Aoyama Gakuin University, Japan
Y. Shigesato, Aoyama Gakuin University, Japan
Correspondent: Click to Email
Film structures or properties are heavily affected by varying incident angle of depositing particles. When sputtered particles are incident on a substrate perpendicularly, columnar structures normal to substrate surface are usually observed. However, when sputtered particles are incident on a substrate obliquely, columnar structures could be grown toward the incident angle of sputtered particles. In this study, we studied how film structure and some properties of Al doped ZnO (AZO) affected by the various incident angles of sputtered particles. AZO films were deposited on alkali-free glass heated at 200@super o@C by dc magnetron sputtering using an AZO ceramic target with substrate angles from 0 to 80@super o@. The substrate angle of 0@super o@ was defined that the direction of incident sputtered particles was normal to the substrate surface, whereas the substrate angle of 90@super o@ was defined that the one was parallel to the substrate. Film structures, electrical and optical properties of AZO films were analyzed by XRD, Hall-effect measurement and NIR-UV spectrometer. Especially, distributions of crystallographic orientations for the crystallites in the films were analyzed by using X pert-MRD (PANalytical) in details. AZO films deposited with the substrate angle at 0@super o@ showed a strong preferred orientation of c-axis normal to the substrate surface. On the other hand, AZO films deposited with the substrate angle at 80@super o@ possessed c-axis inclined corresponding to the incident angle of sputtered particles. As one of the explanations, such c-axis inclined could be caused by shadowing effect. Resistivity of AZO films decreased with increasing the substrate angle up to 60@super o@ and remained almost constant with the further increase in substrate angle up to 80@super o@. This work was partially supported by a Grant-in-Aid for the 21st COE program from the Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) of the Japanese Government.