GROWING OF ZnO THIN FILMS ON DIFFERENT SUBSTRATE MATERIALS BY RF SPUTTERING TECHNIQUE

Kenan Cicek1 Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Ardahan University, Ardahan, Turkey Tevhit Karacali2 Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Ataturk University, Erzurum, Turkey Abstract
We investigated that how to change properties of zinc oxide in the substrate varies. Thus Si, SiO2, Porous-Si and glass wafers were used for substrate. Surface properties and crystal structures of thin films, which prepared with RF sputtering technique, were observed with help of XRD and AFM measurements. Then the results compared with each other to determine the best substrate.

Introduction
The material of ZnO has an excessive interest because of its some properties. These interests are not new. So many years ago researches focused on ZnO to investigate its properties. After many decades ZnO started to show its fabulous properties. Therefore the interests on ZnO are increasing day by day [1]. ZnO has a broad application ratio among II-VI semiconducting materials. It has got a wide band gap (3,37 eV), high chemical stability and great piezoelectric properties [2]. ZnO also has a large exciton binding energy (60 meV) [1]. Some researches proved that ZnO is suitable for space researches. Zinc oxide is very resistant to high-energy radiation. It can resolve in any alkalinity easily [3].

Experimental
We wonder that growing of ZnO thin film depend on substrate or not. Thus we decided to do this work. We used glass, Si, SiO2 and Porous-Si for substrate. The conditions (annealing temperatures, Ar/O2 rates, r.f powers etc.) were same for each substrate. The ZnO films were deposited in an RF magnetron sputtering technique. Sputter deposition is a physical vapor deposition process for depositing thin films, sputtering means ejecting material from a target and depositing it on a substrate such as a silicon wafer. The target is the source material. Substrates are placed in a vacuum chamber and are pumped down to a prescribed process pressure. Sputtering starts when a negative charge is applied to the target material causing a plasma or glow discharge. Positive charged gas ions generated in the plasma region are attracted to the negatively biased target plate at a very high speed. This collision creates a momentum transfer and ejects atomic size particles from the target. These particles are deposited as a thin film into the surface of the substrates [4]. Sputter devices power is 100 w and was worked with 23.4 MHz frequency in sputtering system. Argon was used for carrying gas and O2 gas was used for create ZnO. O2 / Argon rate was 10/1,2. The process of sputterings lasted for half an hour. Thin films were annealed at 400-6000C (glass 4000C, Si, SiO2 and porous-Si 6000C) after sputter.

Figure 3: Cross-sectional view SEM images of ZnO thin films (on porous-Si and Si respectively)

The orientation of ZnO thin film and grain size can be seen in cross-sectional SEM. The ZnO film has a columnar microstructure on each substrate. On porous-Si substrate there are three layers. First layer is Si and second layer is Porous-Si and the other layer is ZnO. There are two layers on Si substrate. Firs layer is Si and the other is ZnO. It is clear that at first time the orientation of thin film on Si substrate was followed the Si substrates orientation and grain size was small. After a while thin film started to grow c-axes orientation and grain size was bigger than the first one. But on porous-Si substrate there was no different process during growth.

Discussion
The crystalline structure and orientation of the deposited films were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD). According to the XRD results, there is ZnO thin film on each substrate. Thus the results prove that the right thing (ZnO) was growth. The orientations of ZnO thin films are nearly the same on each substrate and they show c-axis orientations, regardless of substrate material. The FWHM of ZnO thin films show different value on each substrate. The FWHM of porous-Si substrate is smaller than the other. The grain size is inversely proportional to FWHM. Thus the thin film has big grain size which has small value of FWHM. Because of that, the thin film has big grain size that on porous-Si substrate (Figure 1).

Figure 4: Calculation of Eg on Transmission graphic of the glass sample (not annealed, annealed at 3000C, 4000C respectively).

In order to find glass samples Eg transmission measure was taken from the glass sample. The slope of the curve is equal to the Eg. Thus Eg of thin film can be found by calculating the slope. According to our results Eg does not change by annealing and sputtering parameters. The c-axis lattice constant decrease with thermal annealing for the ZnO thin films deposited on Si or SiO2 [5]. The porous-Si substrate has the same property. Also porous-Si decreases lattice mismatched between substrate and thin film.

Conclusion
ZnO thin films have been growtn on glass, Si, SiO2 and Porous-Si substrates at different temperatures using r.f. magnetron sputtering technique. The XRD measurements revealed that the growing orientation of ZnO is nearly the same, regardless substrate. The FWHM of thin films depend on substrate and annealing temperature. Thus grain size of thin films depends on substrate and annealing temperature [6]. Also XRD shows that on glass wafer there was a ZnO (002) peak, on Si wafer Si (001) and ZnO (002), SiO2 wafer ZnO (002) and on Porous-Si ZnO (002)-(101)-(100) [7]. The SEM images show that on all substrates, ZnO layers growth like columnar. The AFM results show that the porous-Si substrate has a smoothest ZnO surface than the other. All the results show that the most quality of ZnO thin films obtain on Porous-Si substrate. Porous-Si is considered as an effective template for heteroepitaxial growth of lattice mismatched materials [8]. The quality of the thin film depends on substrate but orientation of thin film does not depend on substrate.

Figure 1: XRD patterns for Glass, Si, SiO2 and Porous-Si

The surface properties of the thin films were investigated by AFM. According to AFM results, roughness of thin films is different on each substrate. Thin film on porous-Si substrate is nearly smooth than the others. Also the roughness of thin films is decrease with annealing (Figure 2).

Acknowledgement
This work is supported by BAP 2009/260 project from the Atatrk University , Erzurum. Thanks are due to the staff members of Nano Technology Laboratory, Atatrk University.

References
[1] . zgr. et al. Applied Physics Reviews, 98, 041301(2005) [2] J.-L. Zhao, X.-M. Li, J.-M. Bian, W.-D. Yu, Z.-D. Gao, J. Cryst. Growth, 276 (2005) 507 [3] E.S.Tuzemen., 2007. zno ince filmlerinin eldesi ve aygt retimi iin parametrelerinin optimizasyonu, Ph.D. Thesis,Adana. [4]S.Sultana., 2010. RF Magnetron Sputtering system. India, www.nano.iisc.ernet.in/RF%20sputtering%20manual2010.pdf (14.04.2011). [5] J. Komiyama et al. Fll Meeting of the Electrochemical Society.USA, (2004) [6] Th.Gruber, C.Krchner, and A.Waag., Phys. Stat. Sol.(b) 229, no.2, 841-844(2002). [7] A.N.Banerjee et al. Thin Solid Films 496(2006) 112-116 [8] J. H. Myung, N.H. Kim and H.W. Kim. Mater. Scien. Form., 475-479 (2005)
Figure 2: AFM images of different substrate (glass, Si, SiO2 and Porous-Si respectively)
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