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Silica-controlled structure and optical properties of zinc oxide sol–gel thin films

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Abstract

Transparent and high preferential c-axis-oriented ZnO thin films doped with SiO2 have been prepared by sol–gel method using zinc nitrate and tetraethylorthosilicate as precursors, absolute ethanol as solvent, and diethanolamine as sol stabilizer. Thin film deposition was performed by spin coating technique at a spinning speed of 2000 rpm/sec on glass substrate followed by calcinations at 500 °C. The structural characteristics of the samples were analyzed by x-ray diffractometer and atomic force microscope. The optical properties were studied by an ultraviolet–visible spectrophotometer. The results show that all the prepared ZnO thin films have a compact hexagonal wurtzite structure. With the change in the amount of SiO2 dopants, the intensity of (002) peak, particle size, surface root mean square roughness, thickness, transmittance, absorbance, and the optical band gap of the ZnO–SiO2 thin films were changed as well.

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Acknowledgments

This work was partially financially supported by the Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 20873118), Program for New Century Excellent Talents in University (Grant NCET-08-0665), the Program for Science & Technology Innovation Talents in Universities of Henan Province (2008 HASTIT016), Henan Province Science and Technology Key Project (Grant No. 082102230036), Natural Science Foundation of Henan Province, China (Grant No. 102300410165), and Innovation Scientists and Technicians Troop Construction Projects of Henan Province (Grant No. 10410051001).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Surface Micro and Nano Materials, Xuchang University, Xuchang, 461000, People’s Republic of China

    Yi-Dong Zhang, Li-Wei Wang & Feng-Ling Yang

  2. College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Xuchang University, Xuchang, 461000, People’s Republic of China

    Yi-Dong Zhang, Li-Wei Mi & Zhi Zheng

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  1. Yi-Dong Zhang
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Correspondence to Yi-Dong Zhang.

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Zhang, YD., Wang, LW., Mi, LW. et al. Silica-controlled structure and optical properties of zinc oxide sol–gel thin films. Journal of Materials Research 26, 882–888 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1557/jmr.2011.7

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