Orientation-dependent Electrical and Optical Characteristics of non-epitaxial Al-doped ZnO thin films

Abstract

Based on the theory of crystal anisotropy, it is proposed to improve electrical and optical performance by adjusting the orientation growth of Al-doped ZnO thin films. AZO thin films with preferred (002) and (103) orientation were deposited by stress regulation in the magnetic control sputtering system. The electrical and optical performance for (002) and (103) preferred thin films with identical texture strength and film thickness were analysed in detail. Compared to the conventional (002) preferred AZO thin films, (103) preferentially oriented AZO films exhibit lowering 34.2 % resistivity at the cost of reducing 2.1 % visible light transmittance. XPS fitting analysis of the O1s peak reveals that differences in oxygen vacancy concentration between the two orientations are primarily responsible for variations in electrical properties. It's a promising method by adjusting the orientation growth to improve electrical and optical performance of AZO thin films.