New cost effective ZnO:Al films deposited by large area reactive magnetron sputtering

Author

Sittinger, V. ; Szyszka, B. ; Hong, R.J. ; Werner, W. ; Ruske, M. ; Lopp, A.

Author_Institution

Fraunhofer-Inst. for Surface Eng. & Thin Films, Braunschweig, Germany

Volume

1

fYear

2003

fDate

18-18 May 2003

Firstpage

503

Abstract

Al-doped ZnO (ZnO:Al or AZO) films have successfully been fabricated on large area glass substrates by sputtering Zn-Al metallic targets (Al content 1-2 wt%) in an in-line reactive mid-frequency (MF) magnetron sputtering process. A new target technology (CleanMag/spl trade/) based on moving magnets as well as conventional target technology (TwinMag/spl trade/) were utilized. The dependence of microstructure and the obtained optical and electrical properties of the AZO films on deposition parameters, such as working gas pressure, sputtering MF power and substrate temperature, was investigated in detail. Best results showed an extinction coefficient k of less than 2 /spl times/ 10/sup -3/ and a resistivity /spl rho/ below 270 /spl mu//spl Omega/cm. At Fraunhofer IST a fairly good homogeneity of /spl plusmn/6% on an area of 1000 /spl times/ 600 mm/sup 2/ was obtained.

Keywords

II-VI semiconductors; aluminium; crystal microstructure; electrical resistivity; extinction coefficients; semiconductor growth; semiconductor thin films; sputter deposition; wide band gap semiconductors; zinc compounds; CleanMag/spl trade/; SiO/sub 2/; TwinMag/spl trade/; ZnO:Al; deposition parameter; electrical properties; extinction coefficient; glass substrate; homogeneity; in-line reactive mid-frequency magnetron sputtering; microstructure; optical properties; sputtering MF power; substrate temperature; target technology; working gas pressure;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Energy Conversion, 2003. Proceedings of 3rd World Conference on

Conference_Location

Osaka, Japan

Print_ISBN

4-9901816-0-3

Type

conf

Filename

1305331