GROWTH AND PROPERTIES OF SPIN-COATED TRANSPARENT SN AND AL-DOPED ZNO THIN FILMS

In this work, Zinc Oxide (ZnO) thin films doped and undoped with Sn and Al were grown on ITO substrates by the sol-gel spin coating technique, where the Sn/Zn and Al/Zn atomic ratios were, respectively, 5% and 7% in the solution. SZO and AZO structures were examined using XRD, AFM, SEM, UV-vis spectroscopy, and photoluminescence (PL) to investigate the morphology, structural, and optical characteristics. According to XRD analysis, all of the produced films have a hexagonal wurtzite structure with a polycrystalline nature oriented along the (1 0 0) direction. The crystallite size was calculated using the well-known Scherrer's formula and found to be in the range of 23-40 nm. Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) results revealed that Sn and Al low doping had an impact on the morphological surface of the films. The measurements from the UV-Visible Spectrophotometer (U-Vis) showed that undoped ZnO film has a high optical transparency in the visible region (over >83%), and then the optical band gap of thin films was calculated. PL is observed for ZnO thin films doped and undoped with Sn and Al.