Direct determination of the band offset in atomic layer deposited ZnO/hydrogenated amorphous silicon heterojunctions from X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy valence band spectra

Abstract

The chemical composition and band alignment at the heterointerface between atomic layer deposition-grown zinc oxide (ZnO) and hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) is investigated using monochromatized X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. A new approach for obtaining the valence band offset ΔEV is developed, which consists in fitting the valence band (VB) spectrum obtained for a-Si:H with a thin ZnO overlayer as the sum of experimentally obtained VB spectra of a bulk a-Si:H film and a thick ZnO film. This approach allows obtaining ΔEV = 2.71 ± 0.15 eV with a minimum of assumptions, and also yields information on the change in band bending of both substrate and ZnO film. The band offset results are compared to values obtained using the usual approach of comparing valence band edge-to-core level energy differences, ΔEB,CL − ΔEB,VB. Furthermore, a theoretical value for the VB offset is calculated from the concept of charge neutrality level line-up, using literature data for the charge neutrality levels and the experimentally determined ZnO/a-Si:H interface dipole. The thus obtained value of ΔEVCNL = 2.65 ± 0.3 eV agrees well with the experimental ΔEV.