Effect of annealing on the structural, morphological and photoluminescence properties of ZnO thin films prepared by spin coating

• ZnO thin films were deposited by a spin coating technique on Si substrates.
• Grain growth was observed with an increase in annealing time at 700 °C.
• Si inter-diffusion occurred during annealing.
• Si reduced the Zn vacancy emission while oxygen defect related emission increased.
• The ZnO thin films can be useful for near UV light source applications.

Zinc oxide (ZnO) thin films were deposited on silicon substrates by a sol–gel method using the spin coating technique. The ZnO films were annealed at 700 °C in an oxygen environment using different annealing times ranging from 1 to 4 h. It was observed that all the annealed films exhibited a hexagonal wurtzite structure. The particle size increased from 65 to 160 nm with the increase in annealing time, while the roughness of the films increased from 2.3 to 10.6 nm with the increase in the annealing time. Si diffusion from the substrate into the ZnO layer occurred during the annealing process. It is likely that the Si and O2 influenced the emission of the ZnO by reducing the amount of Zn defects and the creation of new oxygen related defects during annealing in the O2 atmosphere. The emission intensity was found to be dependent on the reflectance of the thin films.

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