Abstract

We present here an in-depth comprehensive study on the interplay between nitrogen (N) and various point defects in ZnO nanorods (NRs) implanted with 50 keV N ions with fluences from 1 × 1014 to 1 × 1016 ions/cm2 followed by a thermal annealing at 450 °C separately in Ar, O2, and excess Zn ambiences. Detailed X-ray diffractometry results reveal that N implantation induced structural damages increase sharply beyond 1 × 1015 ions/cm2. The Raman scattering analyses are indicative of structural disorders due to various N-related defect complexes. The analyses of X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) results validate the incorporation of N at O sublattice forming NO acceptor and NO-VZn acceptor complex in the implanted NRs. Post-implantation annealing in Ar and O2 ambiences causes only NO state, while annealing in excess Zn ambient induces an additional shallow donor (N2)O by substituting N2 at O site. The XPS, Raman scattering, photoluminescence and current-voltage measurement results combiningly illustrate that the post-implantation annealing in O2 and Ar ambiences play a key role to stabilize the N dopants in ZnO NRs via reducing oxygen vacancy and/or preserving the concentration of N-related acceptors. This study would therefore be a benchmark for understanding the role of defects in the N doping in ZnO NRs.

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