• Journal of the Korean Ceramic Society
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.149-154
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• 1996

ZnO and Al-doped ZnO thin films were prepared by sol-gel dip-coating method and electrical and optical properties of films were investigated. Using the zinc acetate dihydrate and acetylaceton(AcAc) as a chelating agent stable ZnO sol was synthesized with HCl catalyst. Adding aluminium chloride to the ZnO sol Al-doped ZnO sol could be also synthesized. As Al contents increase the crystallinity of ZnO thin film was retarded by increased compressive stress in the film resulted from the difference of ionic radius between Zn2+ and Al3+ The thickness of ZnO and Al-doped ZnO thin film was in the range of 2100~2350$\AA$. The resistivity of ZnO thin films was measured by Van der Pauw method. ZnO and Al-doped ZnO thin films with annealing temperature and Al content had the resistivity of 0.78~1.65$\Omega$cm and ZnO and Al-doped ZnO thin film post-annealed at 40$0^{\circ}C$ in vacuum(5$\times$10-5 torr) showed the resistivity of 2.28$\times$10-2$\Omega$cm. And the trans-mittance of ZnO and Al-doped ZnO thin film is in the range of 91-97% in visible range.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.20 no.7
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• pp.351-355
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• 2010

Transparent conducting aluminum-doped ZnO thin films were deposited using a sol-gel process. In this study, the important deposition parameters were investigated thoroughly to determine the appropriate procedures to grow large area thin films with low resistivity and high transparency at low cost for device applications. The doping concentration of aluminum was adjusted in a range from 1 to 4 mol% by controlling the precursor concentration. The annealing temperatures for the pre-heat treatment and post-heat treatment was $250^{\circ}C$ and 400-$600^{\circ}C$, respectively. The SEM images show that Al doped and undoped ZnO films were quite uniform and compact. The XRD pattern shows that the Al doped ZnO film has poorer crystallinity than the undoped films. The crystal quality of Al doped ZnO films was improved with an increase of the annealing temperature to $600^{\circ}C$. Although the structure of the aluminum doped ZnO films did not have a preferred orientation along the (002) plane, these films had high transmittance (> 87%) in the visible region. The absorption edge was observed at approximately 370 nm, and the absorption wavelength showed a blue-shift with increasing doping concentration. The ZnO films annealed at $500^{\circ}C$ showed the lowest resistivity at 1 mol% Al doping.

• Korean Journal of Materials Research
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• v.16 no.7
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• pp.449-454
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• 2006

Al-doped zinc oxide (ZnO:Al) films for transparent electrodes in thin film solar cells were deposited on glass substrates at a low temperature of $200^{\circ}C$ by rf magnetron sputtering. The transmittance of the ZnO:Al films in the visible range was 87%. The lowest resistivity of the ZnO:Al films was about $5.8{\times}10^{-4}{\Omega}$ cm at the Al content of 2.5 wt%. After deposition, the surface of ZnO:Al films were etched in dilute HCl (0.5%) for the investigation of the change in the electrical properties and the surface morphology due to etching.

• The Korean Journal of Ceramics
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.85-92
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• 2001

Thin films of ZnO and Al doped ZnO were prepared by rf magnetron sputter techniques. When the oxygen fraction in Ar-O$_2$ sputter gas was about 2.0%, the films exhibited the composition of Zn:O=1.05:1. The films prepared at 250 W contain larger grains than the films grown at 100 W. However, high deposition rate seems to deteriorates the crystallinity as well as Al-substitution, resulting in lower concentration of mobile electrons. The Al-doped ZnO films which were deposited at $500^{\circ}C$ show resistance of 1$\times$10$^-2$ Wcm; optical band gap of the films ranges from 3.25 to 3.40 eV. These electrical and optical features are related with microstructural as well as crystalline characteristics of the films.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.26 no.3
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• pp.194-197
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• 2013

We investigated the effect of etching time on the surface roughness, and electrical and optical properties of ZnO and 2 wt% Al-doped ZnO (AZO) films. The ZnO and AZO films were deposited on glass substrates by RF magnetron sputtering technique. The etching experiment was carried out using a solution of 5% HCl at room temperature. The surface roughness was characterized by Atomic Force Microscopy. The electrical property was measured by Hall measurement system and 4-point probe. The optical property was characterized by UV-vis spectroscopy. After the wet chemical etching, the surface textures were obtained on the surface of the ZnO and AZO films. With the increase of etching time, the surface roughness (RMS) of the films increased and the transmittance of the films was observed to decrease. For the AZO film, a low resistivity of $1.0{\times}10^{-3}\;{\Omega}{\cdot}cm$ was achieved even after the etching.

• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
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• v.16 no.2
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• pp.59-65
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• 2006

Al-doped and F-doped ZnO (ZnO : Al & ZnO : F) thin films were coated onto glass substrate by sol-gel method. These films showed c-axis orientation in common, but different I(002)/[I(002) + I(101)] and FWHM (full width at half-maximum). In particular, the grain size of the ZnO : Al films decreased with the increase in the Al-doping concentration, while for the ZnO : F films the grain siae increased up to F 3 at% and then decreased. For the electrical properties, Hall effect measurement was used. The resistivity of the ZnO : Al films and the ZnO : F films were, respectively, $2.9{\times}10^{-2}{\Omega}cm$ at Al 1 at% and $3.3{\times}10^{-1}{\Omega}cm$ at F 3 at%. Moreover compared with ZnO:Al films, ZnO:F films have lower carrier concentration (ZnO : Al $4.8{\times}10^{18}cm^{-3}$, ZnO : F $3.9{\times}10^{16}cm^{-3}$) and higher mobility (ZnO : Al $45cm^2/Vs$, ZnO : F $495cm^2/Vs$). For average optical transmittances, ZnO : Al thin films have $86{\sim}90%$ and ZnO : F films have $77{\sim}85%$ comparatively low.

• The Transactions of The Korean Institute of Electrical Engineers
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• v.66 no.10
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• pp.1488-1493
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• 2017

Boron-doped ZnO:Al films were deposited by rf magnetron sputtering. The structural and optical property variations of the films with the boron amounts were studied. ZnO nanorods were grown on $SiO_2/Si$ wafers and glass by a hydrothermal method. ~50 nm-thick boron-doped ZnO:Al films were deposited on the substrates as seed layers. The mixed solution of zinc nitrate hexahydrate and hexamethylenetetramine in DI water was used as a precursor for ZnO nanorods. The concentration of zinc nitrate hexahydrate and that of hexamethylenetetramine were 0.05 mol, respectively. ZnO nanorods were grown at $90^{\circ}C$ for 2 hours. X-ray diffraction was conducted to observe the crystallinity of ZnO nanorods. A field emission scanning electron microscope was employed to study the morphology of nanorods. Optical transmittance was measured by a UV-Vis spectrophotometer, and photoluminescence was carried out with 266 nm light. The ZnO nanorods grown on the 0.5 wt% boron-doped ZnO seed layer showed the best crystallinity.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.19 no.3
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• pp.206-210
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• 2010

Al-doped ZnO thin films were deposited with various Ar flow rate by RF magnetron sputtering, and theire properties were studied. A high-quality thin film was obtained by controlling the Ar flow rate, and the influence of the Ar flow rate on the Al-doped ZnO thin film was confirmed. In all Al-doped ZnO thin films, light transmittance had above 80%. Through Hall measurement and X-ray photoelectron spectrometer, the sample of 60 sccm, which had the lowest resistivity, showed the lower Al concentration. This result was attributed to oxygen vacancy rather than Al concentration.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers Conference
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.535-538
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• 2004

Zinc Oxide (ZnO) films have attracted considerable attention for transparent conducting films, because of their high conductivity, good optical transmittance from UV to near IR as well as a low-cost fabrication. To increase the conductivity of ZnO, doping of group III elements (Al, Ga, In and B) has been carried out. Transparent conducting films have been applied for optoelectric devices, the development of the transparent conducting thin films on flexible light-weight substrates are required. In this research, the transparent conducting ZnO thin films doped with Aluminum (Al) on polymer substrates were deposited by the RF magnetron suputtering method, and the structural, optical and electrical properties were investigated.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.452-452
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• 2013

ZnO is one of the most attractive transparent conductive oxide (TCO) films because of low toxicity, a wide band gap material and relatively low cost. However, the electrical conductivity of un-doped ZnO is too high to use it as TCO films in practical application. To improve electrical properties of undoped ZnO, transition metal (TM) doped ZnO films such as Al doped ZnO or Ti doped ZnO have been extensively studied. Here, we prepared Ti doped ZnO thin films by atomic layer deposition (ALD) for the application of TCO films. ALD was used to prepare Ti-doped ZnO thin films due to its inherent merits such as large area uniformity, precise composition control in multicomponent thin films, and digital thickness controllability. Also, we demonstrated that ALD method can be utilized for fabricating highly ordered freestanding nanostructures of Ti-doped ZnO thin films by combining with BCP templates, which can potentially used in the photovoltaic applications.