Laser ablated nanostructured tin oxide thin films for optoelectronic device applications

Nanostructured tin oxide (SnO₂) thin films are prepared by pulsed laser deposition technique and the films are annealed at different temperatures viz. 300, 400, 500 and 600°C. The as-deposited and annealed films are characterized by X-ray diffraction, micro-Raman spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy, UV-visible spectroscopy and photoluminescence spectroscopy. The films annealed at higher temperature exhibit more intense and sharper X-ray diffraction peaks compared to other annealed films showing their enhanced crystallinity. Raman spectra of nanocrystalline tin oxide exhibits very broad spectral feature extending from 400- 700 cm^-1. All the films exhibit a broad luminescence band centered on 376 nm and a blue emission at 450 and 470 nm.