Abstract
Amorphous In−Zn−O thin films were deposited with various hydrogen flow rates using a magnetron sputtering system. With the addition of hydrogen, the mechanical stability of the films was dramatically improved without any degradation of electrical properties and optical transmittance. The average change in the resistance of the sample deposited at a hydrogen flow rate of 0.4% was approximately six times lower than that in the sample deposited without hydrogen. Both, the compressive residual stress and absorption coefficient of the sample, decreased with hydrogen flow, indicating similar trends with the average change in the resistance. The absorption coefficient near 3.1 eV indicated that subgap state defects also decreased with increasing hydrogen flow rates. It was confirmed that the improvement in mechanical stability was derived from the suppression of subgap defects due to the hydrogen impurity. Thus, we demonstrated that hydrogen is a promising candidate for stabilizing the mechanical properties of oxide thin films.
Highlights
Transparent electrodes (TEs) have assumed importance of the development of displays and electronic devices
We focus on the amorphous In−Zn−O (a-IZO) owing to its excellent etchability, high crystallization temperature, and high electrical and optical properties that are comparable to those of c-In−Sn−O [25,27,28]
We demonstrate the effect of hydrogen flow during sputtering on the mechanical properties of a-IZO thin films
Summary
Transparent electrodes (TEs) have assumed importance of the development of displays and electronic devices. Amorphous TCOs such as a-In−Sn−O, a-In−Zn−O, and a-In−Sn−Zn−O have been studied for flexible devices with high mechanical stability and comparable electrical and optical properties to those of polycrystalline TCOs [12,22,23,24,25,26]. In−Zn−O can maintain a stable amorphous state at higher temperatures about 500 ◦ C For these reasons, we focus on the amorphous In−Zn−O (a-IZO) owing to its excellent etchability, high crystallization temperature, and high electrical and optical properties that are comparable to those of c-In−Sn−O [25,27,28]. We confirmed that the mechanical stability of a-IZO thin films with hydrogen is dramatically improved by adding an appropriate amount of hydrogen, without any observable degradation in the electrical and optical properties
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