Pulsed laser deposition of ZnO thin films for applications of light emission

ZnO is a material suitable for light emission. In order to investigate the light emission properties, ZnO thin films were deposited on 0001.sapphire substrates by pulsed laser deposition PLD.technique using an Nd:YAG laser with a wavelength of 355 nm. The influence of the deposition parameters, such as oxygen pressure, substrate temperature and laser energy density variation on the properties of the grown film, was studied. The experiment was performed for substrate temperatures in the range 200–6008C. The deposition chamber was filled with the oxygen at working pressures between 10y6 and 5=10y1 Torr. According to observations, the intensity of the light emission of laser-ablated ZnO thin films increased as substrate temperatures increased from 200 to 6008C. We investigated the structural, electrical and optical properties of ZnO thin films using X-ray diffraction XRD., van der Pauw Hall measurements, photoluminescence PL., and Rutherford backscattering spectrometry RBS.. q2000 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved