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DS: Fachverband Dünne Schichten

DS 8: Thin film photovoltaics: oxides and nanostructures

DS 8.4: Talk

Monday, March 26, 2012, 17:15–17:30, H 2032

DC magnetron sputtering of ZnO:Al from metallic and reduced ceramic targets: comparison of ion energy distributions — •Christian Wilde and Mykola Vinnichenko — Helmholtz-Zentrum Dresden-Rossendorf, Institute of Ion Beam Physics and Materials Research, Dresden, Germany

Magnetron sputtering is a common technique for deposition of transparent conductive oxides (TCO) such as Al-doped ZnO (AZO). The film growth using either metallic (reactively) or reduced ceramic targets often show different properties and morphology even in case of optimized processes. Therefore it is crucial to understand differences in magnetron plasma leading to such variations of properties.

The energy of ions emitted from the target in these processes is important, because it influences nucleation and the quality of the TCO. The negative ions with energies high enough to damage the growing film are of special interest.

In this contribution we report results of comparative analysis of ion energy distributions in a broad energy range for DC magnetron sputtering using metallic and ceramic targets. The energy distributions of low-energy ions show a similar behaviour for both processes, while in case of high-energy negative ions and fragments of them, they are substantially different . Moreover, magnetron plasma in case of metallic target sputtering shows substantially lower fraction of negatively charged ions with high energy. The observed differences indicate the potential of reactive magnetron sputtering to produce AZO films with less damage, and as a result, with improved properties.