• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2005.11a
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• pp.27-29
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• 2005

ZnO and phosphorus doped ZnO thin films (ZnO:P) are deposited by pulsed laser deposition grown on (001) $Al_{2}O_{3}$. ZnO/ZnO:P/ZnO/$Al_{2}O_{3}$ (multi-layer) structure was used for phosphorus doped ZnO fabrication. This multi-layer structure thin film was annealed at $400^{\circ}C$ for 40 min. The electron concentration of that was changed from $10^{19}$ to $10^{16}/cm^{-3}$ after annealing. ZnO thin films with encapsulated structure showed the enhanced structural and optical properties than phosphorus doped ZnO without encapsulated layer. In this study, encapsulated ZnO structure was suggested to enhance electrical, structural and optical properties of phosphorus doped ZnO thin film and it was identified that encapsulated structure could be used to fabricate high quality phosphorus doped ZnO thin film.

• New & Renewable Energy
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• v.2 no.3
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• pp.31-36
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• 2006

Superstrate pin amorphous silicon thin-film(a-Si:H) solar cells are prepared on $SnO_2:F$ and ZnO:Al transparent conducting oxides(TCO) in order to see the effect of TCO/p-layers on a-Si:H solar cell operation. The solar cells prepared on textured ZnO:Al have higher open circuit voltage VOC than cells prepared on $SnO_2:F$. Presence of thin microcrystalline p-type silicon layer(${\mu}c-Si:H$) between ZnO:Al and p a-SiC:H plays a major role by causing improvement in fill factor as well as $V_{OC}$ of a-Si:H solar cells prepared on ZnO:Al TCO. Without any treatment of pi interface, we could obtain high $V_{OC}$ of 994mV while keeping fill factor(72.7%) and short circuit current density $J_{SC}$ at the same level as for the cells on $SnO_2:F$ TCO. This high $V_{OC}$ value can be attributed to modification in the current transport in this region due to creation of a potential barrier.

• 한국신재생에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2006.06a
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• pp.158-161
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• 2006

Superstrate pin amorphous silicon thin-film (a-Si:H) solar cells are prepared on $SnO_2:F$ and ZnO:Al transparent conducting oxides (TCO) In order to see the effect of TCO/P-layers on a-Si:H solar cell operation. The solar cells prepared on textured ZnO:Al have higher open circuit voltage $V_{oc}$ than cells prepared on $SnO_2:F$. Presence of thin microcrystalline p-type silicon layer $({\mu}c-Si:H)$ between ZnO:Al and p a-SiC:H plays a major role by causing improvement in fill factor as well as $V_{oc}$, of a-Si:H solar cells prepared on ZnO:Al TCO. Without any treatment of pi interface, we could obtain high $V_{oc}$, of 994mv while keeping fill factor (72.7%) and short circuit current density $J_{sc}$ at the same level as for the cells on $SnO_2:F$ TCO. This high $V_{oc}$ value can be attributed to modification in the current transport in this region due to creation of a potential barrier.

• Korean Journal of Crystallography
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• v.6 no.2
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• pp.134-140
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• 1995

SAW properties of SiNx/ZnO bilayer thin film structure were analyzed. ZnO thin films were deposited by rf magnetron sputter using O2 gas as an oxidizer. Structure of ZnO thin films was affected by Ar/O2 ratio. At the gas ratio of Ar/O2=67/33, the standard deviation of X-ray rocking curve of (002) preferred ZnO thin film was 2.17 degree. This value is sufficient to use ZnO thin films as an acoustic element. SAW velocity of glass/SiNx(7000Å)/Al/ZnO(5μm) structure was max. 2.2% faster than that of ZnO/glass.

• Transactions on Electrical and Electronic Materials
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.67-72
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• 2008

Al-doped p-type ZnO thin films were fabricated by RF magnetron sputtering on n-Si (100) and homo-buffer layers in pure oxygen ambient. ZnO ceramic mixed with 2 wt% $Al_2O_3$ was selected as a sputtering target. XRD spectra show that the Al-doped ZnO thin films have ZnO crystal structure. Hall Effect experiments with Van der Pauw configuration show that p-type carrier concentrations are arranged from $1.66{\times}10^{16}$ to $4.04{\times}10^{18}\;cm^{-2}$, mobilities from 0.194 to $198\;cm^2V{-1}s^{-1}$ and resistivities from 0.0963 to $18.4\;{\Omega}cm$. FESEM cross section images of different parts of a p-type ZnO:Al thin film annealed at $800^{\circ}C$ show a compact structure. Measurement for same sample shows that density is $5.40\;cm^{-3}$ which is smaller than theoretically calculated value of $5.67\;cm^{-3}$. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra at 10 K show a shoulder peak of p-type ZnO film at about 3.117 eV which is ascribed to electron transition from donor level to acceptor level (DAP).

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.24 no.3
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• pp.177-181
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• 2011

We have studied structural, optical, and electrical properties of the Al-doped ZnO (AZO) thin films being usable in transparent conducting oxides. The AZO thin films were deposited on the corning 1737 glass plate by the RF magnetron sputtering system. To find optimal properties of AZO for transparent conducting oxides, the RF power in sputtering process was varied as 40 W, 60 W, and 80 W, respectively. As RF power increased, the crystallinity of AZO thin film was decreased, the optical bandgap of AZO thin film increased. The transmittance of the film was over 80% in the visible light range regardless of the changes in RF power. The measurement of Hall effect characterizes the whole thin film as n-type, and the electrical property was improved with increasing RF power. The structural, optical, and electrical properties of the AZO thin films were affected by Al dopant content in AZO thin film.

• Journal of Sensor Science and Technology
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• v.19 no.1
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• pp.58-61
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• 2010

This paper describes the fabrication and characteristics of NO sensor using ZnO thin film by RF magnetron sputter system. The sensitivity, working temperature, and response time of sputtered pure ZnO thin film and added catalysts such as Pt, Pd, Al, Ti on those films were measured and analyzed. The sensitivity of pure ZnO thin film at working temperature of $300^{\circ}C$ is 0.875 in NO gas concentration of 0.046 ppm. At same volume of the gas in chamber, measuring sensitivity of 1.87 at $250^{\circ}C$ was the case of Pt/ZnO thin film. The ZnO thin films added with catalyst materials were showed higher sensitivity, lower working temperature and faster adsorption characteristics to NO gas than pure ZnO thin film.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.20 no.7
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• pp.351-355
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• 2010

Transparent conducting aluminum-doped ZnO thin films were deposited using a sol-gel process. In this study, the important deposition parameters were investigated thoroughly to determine the appropriate procedures to grow large area thin films with low resistivity and high transparency at low cost for device applications. The doping concentration of aluminum was adjusted in a range from 1 to 4 mol% by controlling the precursor concentration. The annealing temperatures for the pre-heat treatment and post-heat treatment was $250^{\circ}C$ and 400-$600^{\circ}C$, respectively. The SEM images show that Al doped and undoped ZnO films were quite uniform and compact. The XRD pattern shows that the Al doped ZnO film has poorer crystallinity than the undoped films. The crystal quality of Al doped ZnO films was improved with an increase of the annealing temperature to $600^{\circ}C$. Although the structure of the aluminum doped ZnO films did not have a preferred orientation along the (002) plane, these films had high transmittance (> 87%) in the visible region. The absorption edge was observed at approximately 370 nm, and the absorption wavelength showed a blue-shift with increasing doping concentration. The ZnO films annealed at $500^{\circ}C$ showed the lowest resistivity at 1 mol% Al doping.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.34 no.1
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• pp.39-43
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• 2021

In the case of ZnO:Al thin films, it is the best material that can replace ITO that is mainly used as a transparent electrode in electronic devices such as solar cells and flat-panel displays. In this study, ZnO:Al films were fabricated by using the RF dual magnetron sputtering method at various substrate temperatures. As the substrate temperature increased, the crystallinity of the ZnO:Al thin films was improved, and the electrical conductivity and electrical properties of the thin film improved owing to the increase in grain size. In addition, the surface roughness of the ZnO:Al thin films increased due to changes in the surface and density of the thin films. Moreover, the substrate temperature increased the density of thin films and improved their transmittance. To be applied to solar cells and other several electronic devices in the future, the hardness and adhesion properties of the thin film improve as the substrate temperature increases.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.688-688
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• 2013

Al-doped ZnO (AZO) thin films have attracted a lot of attention as a cheap transparent conducting oxide (TCO) material that can replace the expensive Sn-doped In2O3. In particular, AZO thin films are widely used as a window layer of chalcogenide-based thin film solar cells such as Cu(In,Ga)Se2 and Cu2ZnSnS4 (CZTS). Mostly important requirements for the window layer material of the thin film solar cells are the high transparency and the low sheet resistance, because they influence the light absorption by the activelayer and the electron collection from the active layer, respectively. In this study, we prepared the AZO thin films by RF magnetron sputtering using a ZnO/Al2O3 (98：2wt%) ceramic target, and the effect of the sputtering condition such as the working pressure, RF power, and the working distance on the optical, electrical, and crystallographic properties of the AZO thin films was investigated. The AZO thin films with optimized properties were used as a window layer of CZTS thin film solar cells. The CZTS active layers were prepared by the electrochemical deposition and the subsequent sulfurization process, which is also one of the cost-effective synthetic approaches. In addition, the solar cell properties of the CZTS thin film solar cells, such as the photocurrent density-voltage (J-V) characteristics and the external quantum efficiency (EQE) were investigated.