Effects of Laser Pulse Energy and Annealing Process on Physical Properties of Nanostructured SiO<sub>2</sub> Prepared by Pulse Laser Deposition

Abstract

Silicon dioxide thin film of different thicknesses has been grown on glass substrate by pulsed laser deposition technique with and without annealing temperature under the vacuum pressure of 8×10-2 mbar. The optical properties such as the absorption, and transmission spectra have been studied for the prepared SiO2 thin film before and after annealing temperature. From the transmission spectra, the optical gap and linear refractive index of the SiO2 thin film was determined. The structure of the SiO2 thin film was tested with X-Ray diffraction, it was formed to be amorphous structure before annealing temperature. The effects of laser pulse energy on the optical properties has been studied before and after annealing temperature. It is found that almost optical properties depends on the laser pulse energy and increases with increasing laser pulse energy and they are enhanced with the annealing temperature. Keywords: SiO2 thin film, pulse laser deposition, annealing temperature.