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Ion Beam Analysis of Amorphous and Nanocrystalline Group III-V Nitride and ZnO Thin Films

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The ion beam analysis (IBA) techniques of Rutherford backscattering spectrometry (RBS), elastic recoil detection analysis (ERDA), nuclear reaction analysis (NRA), and particle-induced x-ray emission (PIXE) have been used to quantitatively determine composition, uniformity, impurity, and elemental depth profiles of major, minor, and trace elements of group III-V nitride and zinc oxide (ZnO) thin films prepared by various growth techniques. The IBA revealed that an amorphous GaN film prepared by ion beam assisted deposition (IBAD) has large variations in film thickness and composition coupled with typically 10–20% oxygen that was found to be essential to stabilize their amorphous structure. The IBA characterization of plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy (PAMBE) grown GaN, InN, and InCrN films revealed composition, impurity, and uniformity information of the films. The IBA of ZnO films prepared by radio frequency (RF) sputtering showed that the Zn/O ratio often varied significantly over the film thickness. Hydrogen was found to be a major impurity in the films with around one present in the as-deposited ZnO films. It is clearly shown that the nondestructive, quantitative, and rapid IBA measurements are very useful to develop and optimize growth protocols in respect to film thickness, stoichiometry, and especially in regard to hydrogen and oxygen impurities for group III-V nitride and ZnO thin films prepared by various growth techniques.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the GNS Science (formerly the Institute of Geological & Nuclear Sciences) IBA team members and our collaborators from the Victoria University of Wellington, the University of Canterbury, and the University of Auckland for their significant contributions to the work discussed in this paper. This project is supported by the Foundation for Research Science and Technology of New Zealand.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Isotope Centre, GNS Science, Lower Hutt, New Zealand

    J. Kennedy & A. Markwitz

  2. The MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology, Victoria University of Wellington, Wellington, New Zealand

    J. Kennedy, A. Markwitz, H. J. Trodahl & B. J. Ruck

  3. Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, MacDiarmid Institute for Advanced Materials and Nanotechnology, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand

    S. M. Durbin

  4. Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, The University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

    W. Gao

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  1. J. Kennedy
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Correspondence to J. Kennedy.

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Kennedy, J., Markwitz, A., Trodahl, H.J. et al. Ion Beam Analysis of Amorphous and Nanocrystalline Group III-V Nitride and ZnO Thin Films . J. Electron. Mater. 36, 472–482 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11664-006-0051-y

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