• Korean Journal of Metals and Materials
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• v.50 no.11
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• pp.847-854
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• 2012

Al-doped ZnO (AZO) thin films were grown on quartz substrates by the sol-gel method. The effects of the Al mole fraction on the structural and optical properties of the AZO thin films were investigated by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), and UV-VIS spectroscopy. The particle size of the AZO thin films decreased with an increase in Al concentrations. The optical parameters, the optical band gap, absorption coefficient, refractive index, dispersion parameter, and optical conductivity, were studied in order to investigate the effects of Al concentration on the optical properties of AZO thin films. The dispersion energy, single-oscillator energy, average oscillator wavelength, average oscillator strength, and refractive index at an infinite wavelength of the AZO thin films were affected by the Al incorporation. The optical conductivity of the AZO thin films also increased with increasing photon energy.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.31 no.3
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• pp.150-155
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• 2021

Zinc oxide (ZnO) based transparent conducting oxides (TCO) thin films, are used in many applications such as solar cells, flat panel displays, and LEDs due to their wide bandgap nature and excellent electrical properties. In the present work, fluorine and aluminium-doped ZnO targets are prepared and thin films are deposited on soda-lime glass substrate using a RF magnetron sputtering unit. The aluminium concentration is fixed at 2 wt%, and the fluorine concentration is adjusted between 0 to 2.0 wt% with five different concentrations, namely, Al2ZnO98(AZO), F0.5AZO97.5(FAZO1), F1AZO97(FAZO2), F1.5AZO96.5(FAZO3), and F2AZO96(FAZO4). Thin films are deposited with an RF power of 40 W and working pressure of 5 m Torr at 270 ℃. The morphological analysis performed for the thin film reveals that surface roughness decreases in FAZO1 and FAZO2 samples when doped with a small amount of fluorine. Further, optical and electrical properties measured for FAZO1 sample show average optical transmissions of over 89 % in the visible region and 82.5 % in the infrared region, followed by low resistivity and sheet resistance of 3.59 × 10-4 Ωcm and 5.52 Ω/sq, respectively. In future, these thin films with excellent optoelectronic properties can be used for thin-film solar cell and other optoelectronics applications.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2011.02a
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• pp.401-401
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• 2011

In this work, we deposited Al2O3doped ZnO (AZO) thin films by direct current (DC) magnetron sputtering method with a $40^{\circ}$ tilted target, for application in the front layer of thin film solar cell. Wet chemical etching behavior of AZO films was also investigated. In order to optimize textured AZO films, oxalic acid ($C_2H_2O_4$)has been used as wet etchant of AZO film. In this experiment we used 0.001% concentration of oxalic acid various etching time, that showed an anisotropy in etching texture of AZO films. Electrical resistivity, Hall mobility and carrier concentration measurements are performed by using the Hall measurement, that are $6{\times}10^{-4}{\Omega}cm$, $20{\sim}25cm^2/V-s$ and $4{\sim}6{\times}10^{20}$, respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2008.06a
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• pp.471-472
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• 2008

The properties of Al doped ZnO (AZO) thin flim for solar cells with various input currents were studied in this paper. Using facing target sputtering with 2wt.% AZO targets, TCO films were deposited on glass(corning 2948) substrate at room temperature. AZO thin films were deposited by 0.2A, 0.4A, 0.6A and 0.8A at the thickness of 300nm. Electrical, optical and structural of thin films investigated by a Hall effect measurement (Ecopia), an UV-VIS spectrometer(HP) and a X-ray diffractometer (Rigaku). As a results, all thin films showed transmittance about 80%, respectively and resistivity was $7.67\times10^{-4}\Omega$-cm at 0.6A.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.21 no.9
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• pp.863-867
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• 2008

In this paper, to increase the light current efficiency of photodiode, we fabricated aluminum-doped zinc oxide(AZO) thin films by RF magnetron sputtering. AZO thin films were deposited at low temperature of 100 $^{\circ}C$ and different RF powers of 50, 100, 150 and 200 W due to selective process technology. Then the AZO thin films were annealed at 400 $^{\circ}C$ for 1 hr in vacuum ambient to increase crystalline. The lowest resistivity of 1.35 ${\times}$ $10^{-3}$ ${\Omega}cm$ and a high transmittance over 90 % were obtained under the conditions of 3 mTorr, 100 'c and 150 W. The optimized AZO thin films were deposited as anti-reflection coating on PN junction of silicon photodiode. It was confirmed by the result of $V_r-I_{ph}$ curve that the efficiency of photodiode with AZO thin film was enhanced 17 % more than commercial photodiode.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.37 no.2
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• pp.169-174
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• 2024

In this study, the structural, electrical, and optical properties of AZO films of various thicknesses are compared. The AZO films were deposited on a glass substrate by FTS (Facing-Target-Sputtering) This research was conducted to find the optimal thickness for Transparent Conductive Oxide (TCO). AZO has suitable properties for TCO such as low resistivity, and high transmittance. Thin films of all thicknesses showed a transmittance of over 80% in the visible light region and electrical properties improved as thickness increased. It was confirmed that the film of 300 nm thick had the best performance due to its low resistivity, and uniform surface. This research is expected to help find optimal conditions in various fields where TCO is used, such as solar cells, displays, and sensors in the future.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
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• 2009.07a
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• pp.1343_1344
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• 2009

In this work, transparent conducting Al-doped zinc oxide (AZO) films were prepared on Corning glass substrate by RF magnetron sputtering using an Al-doped ZnO target (Al: 2 wt.%) at room temperature and all films were deposited with athickness of 150 nm. We investigated the effects of the post-annealing temperature and the annealing ambient on structural, electrical and optical properties of AZO films. The films were annealed at temperatures ranging from 300 to $500^{\circ}C$ in steps of $100^{\circ}C$ using rapid thermal annealing equipment in oxygen. The thickness of the film was observed by field emission scanning electron microscopy (FE-SEM) and grain size was calculated from the XRD spectra using the Scherrer equation and their electrical properties were investigated using a hole measurement and the reflectance of AZO films was investigated by UV-VIS spectrometry.

• Journal of the Korean institute of surface engineering
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• v.39 no.3
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• pp.98-104
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• 2006

Al-doped ZnO (AZO) films were deposited on the plastic substrate by inductively coupled plasma (ICP) assisted DC magnetron sputtering. The AZO films were produced by sputtering a metallic target (Zn/Al) in a mixture of argon and oxygen gases. AZO films with an electrical resistivity of ${\sim}10^3\;{\Omega}cm$ and an optical transmittance of 80% were obtained even at a low deposition temperature. In-situ process control methods were used to obtain stable deposition conditions in the transition region without any hysteresis effect. The target voltage was controlled either at a constant DC power. It was found that the ratio of the zinc to oxygen emission intensity, I (O 777)/I (Zn 481) decreased with increasing the target voltage in the transition region. The $Ar/O_2$ plasma treatment improve the adhesion strength between the polycarbonate substrate and AZO films.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.97-102
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• 2013

Aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO) thin films were prepared by dc magnetron sputtering at room temperature and the effect of heat treatment on the structural, electrical and optical properties of the films were examined. As the annealing temperature and time increased, the resistivity decreased and the transmittance improved. All AZO films had c-axis oriented (002) plane of ZnO, regardless of the annealing process employed. As the annealing temperature and time increased, the crystallinity of AZO thin films increased due to the formation of a new ZnO phase in which Al was substituted for Zn. However, at the high annealing temperature of $400^{\circ}C$, the resistivity of the films increased via separation of Zn and Al from ZnO phase due to their low melting points. X-ray diffraction, field emission scanning electron micrograph and Hall effect measurement confirmed the formation of uniformly distributed new grains of ZnO substituted with Al. The variation of Al contents in AZO films was shown to be the primary factor for the changes in resistivity and carrier concentration of the films.

• Journal of the Semiconductor & Display Technology
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.30-34
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• 2016

We investigated magnetic field, discharged voltage, and as-deposited film uniformity at facing targets sputtering (FTS) system with magnetic field type: i) concentrated and ii) distributed magnetic field type. And Al doped ZnO (AZO) films were prepared at two magnetic field type such as concentrated magnetic field type and distributed magnetic field type, respectively. Discharge voltage at the distribution type is lower than concentration type due to low magnetic flux (middle magnetic flux: Concentration 1200 G and Distribution 600 G). The films deposited at the distributed magnetic field were more uniform than concentration type. All of prepared AZO films had a resistivity of under $10^{-4}[{\Omega}{\cdot}cm]$ and a transmittance of more than 85 % in the visible range.