Sputtered ZnS thin film from nanoparticles synthesized by hydrothermal route

RF-sputtered Zinc sulfide thin films with nano-scale grains of about 35 nm were grown, under various substrate temperatures ranging from room-temperature to 200 °C. The target was made from ZnS powder synthesized by hydrothermal route at 180 °C for 24 h. The structural, optical and electrical properties of the samples were investigated in order to study the effect of deposition temperature. From XRD patterns the ZnS nanoparticles, with grain size of 17 nm, exhibit hexagonal structure whereas the as-deposited ZnS thin films exhibit cubic structure with (1 1 1) as the preferential orientation. UV-vis-NIR spectrophotometric measurements showed that the films were highly transparent (∼75-95%). The optical band gap varies between 3.72 eV and 3.87 eV. The resistivity is between 300 and 700 Ω cm.