Low temperature synthesis of VO2 and hysteresis free VOx thin films with high temperature coefficient of resistance for bolometer applications

Vanadium dioxide (VO2) is an insulator to metal phase transition material, which finds many electronic and optical applications due to its reversible switching while VOx-based bolometers are widely used in commercial uncooled infrared detectors due to their high-temperature coefficient of resistance and low resistivity. Atmospheric pressure thermal oxidation (APTO) of Vanadium (V) is a simple process used to synthesize VO2 films without the need for precise control of oxygen partial pressure unlike other synthesis methods. In this work, we report the effect of reducing the V oxidation temperature to 250-450 degrees C during APTO and synthesize films with different oxidation durations. For an optimized oxidation duration at each oxidation temperature, VO2 films are obtained with more than two orders of resistance switching. This optimum oxidation duration is found to decrease exponentially with increase in oxidation temperature with an activation energy of 1.05 eV. The phase transition temperature of these VO2 films is found to decrease monotonically with decrease in oxidation temperature. We also observe that partially oxidized (oxidation time less than optimized oxidation duration to form VO2) VOx films show broad resistance switching from room temperature up to 70 degrees C instead of steep switching at the phase transition temperature. The partially oxidized film shows a temperature coefficient of resistance (TCR) as high as similar to 10%/K, which is 3-4 times greater than TCR of commercial VOx thin films used in bolometers while showing similar resistivity. The resistivity of these films also exhibits almost zero hysteresis with temperature, an important requirement for bolometer applications. This study will widen the usefulness of the APTO process for fabricating VO2-based devices and high TCR VOx films for bolometer applications. The demonstrated low temperature process will especially be suitable to integrate VO2/VOx on substrates which can sustain only low temperatures such as some of the flexible substrates.