Study of structural and optical properties of iron doped ZnO thin films prepared by sol-gel

Laboratoire de Génie de l’Environnement, Université de Béjaia, Route de Targa Ouzemour, Béjaia 0600, Algeria

^a e-mail: azeddinechelouche@gmail.com

Received: 19 July 2013
Accepted: 24 September 2013
Published online: 25 October 2013

Abstract

Fe doped ZnO thin films with various levels of iron doping concentration (0, 1, 2, 3 at.%) content were produced by sol-gel dip coating method. The influence of Fe doping on the structural, morphological and optical properties of ZnO thin films was investigated. X-ray diffraction has shown that the films are polycrystalline and textured with the hexagonal structure. Scanning electron microscope has indicated that crystallites dispersion in the films is generally homogeneous and the particle morphology changes with increase in the doping concentration. FTIR measurements show that the intensity of Zn-O band increases with increasing doping concentration and the UV-visible transmittance results show a high transparency in the visible range. The room temperature photoluminescence (PL) spectra of Fe doped ZnO indicate that the green-orange emission decrease with increasing Fe doping.