Plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition of zinc oxide at atmospheric pressure and low temperature

The plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition of aluminum-doped zinc oxide has been demonstrated for the first time at 800 Torr and under 250 °C. A film resistivity of 3×10-2Ωcm and a transparency of 95% from 375 to 2500 nm was obtained for deposition at 20-mTorr diethylzinc, 1.0 Torr CO2CO2, 799 Torr He, a TMAl/DEZn ratio of 1:100, 41W/cm3 RF power, and 225 °C. The average aluminum concentration in the ZnO film was 5.4×1020cm-3. It was found that, while the growth rate did not change with substrate temperature, both the resistivity and optical absorption coefficient declined with increasing temperature.