Characterization of ZnO Thin Films Produced by Thermal Evaporation Method

In recent years semiconductor materials have become important for electronic, optoelectronic and sensor applications. ZnO has a band gap energy of 3.37 eV and a larger excition binding energy(60 meV). ZnO is cheap, non-toxic, abundant in nature, and light-emitting semiconductor. Due to these advantages of ZnO, making it important for research in application areas such as thin film transistörs, LED devices and photodedector. The purpose of this thesis is to growth of ZnO thin films using thermal evaporation method at different thickness, annealing temperature and substrate and to investigate the structural, optical and electrical properties of these films in depth. In this study SEM, XRD, AFM, and electrical analyisis were performed. By establishing a feedback loop between the film characterization and the growth conditions, the properties of ZnO films can be easily adopted to different applications. As a result of this study, in the 150 nm thick samples annealed at 300˚C and 400˚C for 2 hours, ZnO deposited on the glass substrate and deposited on the Si substrate (ZnO / Si) at 300 nm thickness annealed at 300˚C and 400˚C for 2 hours, ZnO phases with good physical properties were obtained. In addition, nanorod and nanowire structures observed in ZnO thin films deposited on both substrates(glass and Si) are preferred for optoelectronic and sensor applications.