Abstract
In this article, we report on the fabrication, microstructure, crystallinity, electrical, and optical characteristics of gallium-doped zinc oxide (GZO) thin films grown by atomic layer deposition (ALD). Both thermal-mode ALD (TM-ALD) using H 2 O or/O 3 as oxidant and plasma-mode ALD (PM-ALD) using O 2 as oxidant were employed to deposit GZO films on the glass substrates. Then, a sandwich structure of GZO films was accomplished by layer-by-layer growth method. The performance of GZO films can be improved by modulating the growth temperature and introducing various oxygen sources. Eventually, for O 2 -based ALD, the GZO films exhibit a roughness value of 1.6 nm, resistivity of 3.8 × 10 -3 Ω-cm, carrier concentration of 3.4 × 10 20 cm- 3 , average optical transmittance of above 90% in the visible and infrared regions. All results present that the transparent conducting GZO films deposited by ALD are suitable for the applications of optoelectronic devices such as light-emitting diodes and solar cells. © 2013 The Electrochemical Society.