Exploring the effects of substrate and substrate temperature on the properties of radio frequency magnetron sputtered ZnO thin films

The physical and optical properties of zinc oxide thin films strongly depend on the film deposition techniques. In this work, RF magnetron sputtering was used to deposit ZnO thin films on various substrates (glass, quartz, ITO-coated glass, FTO-coated glass, Si(100), Si(100)/ SiO2) to study the role of substrate and substrate temperature on the morphological, structural and optical properties of the film grown. A detailed discussion on various aspects like surface morphology, strain, photoluminescence, bandgap, surface roughness, and material composition has been done. Compressive stress was present in the films created at room temperature and differed for various substrates based on the lattice mismatch. The nature and temperature of the substrate are found to affect the surface topography of films. Substrate and substrate temperature influenced the emission characteristics of ZnO thin films. In oxygen-rich substrates, defect emissions differed. We found that quartz is a better substrate to fabricate ZnO at room temperature and both Si and Si/SiO2 are preferable at high temperatures due to the lower lattice mismatch and thermal expansion coefficient. Comparing the electrical characteristics of ZnO thin films grown on glass and quartz substrates, ZnO on glass exhibited lower resistivity and higher carrier concentration. The Triboelectric nanogenerator (TENG) combining ZnO and PDMS, was developed to operate in vertical contact-separation mode. The obtained open circuit voltage was 30 V and 33 V for ZnO grown over ITO and FTO respectively, and the slight increase is due to the rougher film's surface on FTO than ITO. The selection of substrate is crucial in many applications and our findings provide an overview of the suitability of substrate and substrate temperature for the fabrication of ZnO thin film-based optoelectronic devices.