Investigation of the structural, optical and electrical properties of Nd-doped ZnO thin films deposited by spray pyrolysis

¹ Université Mohammed V-Agdal, Faculté des Sciences, LPM, B.P. 1014, Rabat, Morocco
² Departmento de Física Aplicada C-XII, Universidad Autόnoma de Madrid, Madrid, Spain
³ MASCIR Moroccan Advanced Science, Innovation and Research Foundation, ENSET, Av. Armée Royale, Rabat, Morocco
⁴ InESS, UMR CNRS 7163 UDS, 23 rue du Loess, B.P. 43, 67037 Strasbourg, France
⁵ IPCMS,UMR CNRS 7504 UDS-ECPM, 23 rue du Loess, B.P. 43, 67034 Strasbourg, France

^a e-mail: a-lefdil@fsr.ac.ma
^b e-mail: mabdlefdil@gmail.com

Received: 24 September 2012
Revised: 13 December 2012
Accepted: 2 January 2013
Published online: 31 January 2013

Abstract

Neodymium-doped zinc oxide (NZO) thin films were deposited on glass substrates by spray pyrolysis technique. X-ray diffraction patterns have shown that both undoped and Nd-doped ZnO films exhibit the hexagonal wurtzite crystal structure with a preferential orientation along [0 0 2] direction.

The effective doping concentration has been determined by Rutherford backscattering measurements showing that the neodymium is not incorporated easily into ZnO host matrix. The surface roughness was shown to increase with Nd doping. NZO films are highly transparent in the visible region. The lowest electrical resistivity value of about 4.0 10⁻² Ω cm was obtained for 1% Nd effective doping.