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Effect of annealing on electrical, structural, and optical properties of sol–gel ITO thin films
Author(s) -
Hammad Talaat Moussa
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
physica status solidi (a)
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.532
H-Index - 104
eISSN - 1862-6319
pISSN - 1862-6300
DOI - 10.1002/pssa.200881781
Subject(s) - annealing (glass) , materials science , electrical resistivity and conductivity , thin film , indium tin oxide , transmittance , band gap , surface roughness , sol gel , atmospheric temperature range , composite material , optoelectronics , nanotechnology , physics , meteorology , electrical engineering , engineering
Indium tin oxide (ITO) thin films (In/Sn = 90:10) prepared by the sol–gel dip‐coating process on glass substrates, followed by annealing in air in the temperature range 150–550 °C were studied. Overall the films structure, surface roughness, and electrical performances are improved, leading to electrical resistivity fifth order of magnitude larger than before annealing and a more compact and crystalline films, translated by a preferential orientation in the (111) direction. Besides that, the films are highly transparent in the visible range, where it shows an average transmittance of 92.3% after annealing to 550 °C. The allowed direct band gap at temperature range 150–550 °C was estimated to be 3.32–4.21 eV, increasing as the annealing temperature also increases.