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Effect of annealing temperature in nitrogen atmosphere and under vacuum on structural, optical and electrical properties of sputtered ITO/Ni/ITO multilayer

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Abstract

ITO/Ni/ITO multilayers were deposited on glass substrates by RF sputtering. These multilayers were annealed at temperatures between 200 and 500 °C, under two different atmospheres: nitrogen gas (N2) and vacuum. Optical measurements show that the films treated under nitrogen gas, have a higher average transmittance in the visible range, which reaches 84% after annealing at 500 °C. While for vacuum annealed films, it reaches only 69%. However, for the electrical properties, the vacuum-treated films show better performance with an electrical resistivity of 1.42 × 10–4 Ω cm at the annealing temperature of 500 °C, which is much lower than that found in N2-treated films (5.54 × 10–4 Ω cm). Based on the figure of merit, it is found that the thin films annealed in N2 show better performance and the maximum reached was 2.3 × 10–2 Ω−1.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Nanomaterials for Energy and Environment Laboratory, Physics Department, Faculty of Science Semlalia, Cadi Ayyad University, P.O. Box 2390, 40000, Marrakech, Morocco

    Abdelali Agdad, Abdelaziz Tchenka, Mounir Chaik, Salma Kaotar Hnawi, Mustapha Azizan, Elmaati Ech-chamikh & Youssef Ijdiyaou

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Agdad, A., Tchenka, A., Chaik, M. et al. Effect of annealing temperature in nitrogen atmosphere and under vacuum on structural, optical and electrical properties of sputtered ITO/Ni/ITO multilayer. Appl. Phys. A 128, 338 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00339-022-05463-7

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