STRUCTURAL PROPERTIES OF ZNO FILMS PREPARED BY RF SPUTTERING FOR OPTICAL APPLICATIONS

To utilize films of dielectric materials, such as ZnO, in optoelectronic devices it is necessary to know how the film properties correlate with the engineering design parameters. The most important film property is the crystalline grain structure which directly affects the acoustic, dielectric and optical parameters of the films. In this paper, we discuss the structural properties and the deposition conditions of ZnO films prepared by reactive r.f. sputtering on glass and sapphire substrates. The structural properties have been studied taking into account the efficiency and the relative speed of the reflection high energy electron diffraction analysis process. The optical properties have been studied by the analysis of optical waveguides. The results have shown that the film microstructure influences the optical response.