The influence of ambient conditions on properties of MgxZn1−xO films by sputtering

The MgxZn1−xO films were prepared in different Ar–O2 mixture ambience by magnetron sputtering. According to the X-ray diffraction (XRD) patterns and the energy dispersive X-ray spectroscopy (EDS) results, it was found that the Mg contents in the films varied with the different ratios of O2/O2+Ar, and the crystal quality of the films improved with the increasing of Mg contents. Meanwhile, the ultraviolet and visible (UV–vis) absorption spectroscopy indicated that the band gap of the films also increased. Moreover, it could be seen that the photoluminescence (PL) spectrum was different from that of undoped Zinc oxide (ZnO) films or the results in other reports on the MgxZn1−xO films: there was no blueshift effect happening for the near-band-edge (NBE) emission in MgxZn1−xO films with different Mg contents.