Deposition of indium tin oxide thin films by cathodic arc ion plating

Indium tin oxide (ITO) thin films have been deposited by cathodic arc ion plating (CAIP) using sintered oxide target as the source material. In an oxygen atmosphere of 200 °C, ITO films with a lowest resistivity of 2.2×10−4 Ω-cm were obtained at a deposition rate higher than 450 nm/min. The carrier mobility of ITO shows a maximum at some medium pressures. Although morphologically ITO films with a very fine nanometer-sized structure were observed to possess the lowest resistivity, more detailed analyses based on X-ray diffraction are attempted to gain more insight into the factors that govern electron mobility in this investigation.