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Influence of cobalt doping on the crystalline structure, optical and mechanical properties of ZnO thin films

IR@NPL: CSIR-National Physical Laboratory, New Delhi

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Title Influence of cobalt doping on the crystalline structure, optical and mechanical properties of ZnO thin films
 
Creator Bahadur, Nupur
Srivastava, A. K.
Kumar, Sushil
M. , Deepa
Nag, Bhavya
 
Subject Materials Science
Physics
 
Description Uniform and transparent thin films of Zn1 − xCoxO (0 ≤ x ≤ 0.10) were fabricated by sol–gel spin coating technique. Co addition up to x = 0.075, led to refinement in structure and improvement in film quality together with average grain size reduction from 17 nm in undoped ZnO to 15 nm with x = 0.05 and 12 nm with x = 0.10 Co additions. For x ≥ 0.035, CoO (cubic) was detected as the secondary phase. Influence of Co addition on the volume fraction of grain boundaries has been interpreted. Increase in Co content in the range 0 ≤ x ≤ 0.10 led to quenching of near-band edge and blue emissions, decrease in band gap energy (Eg) from 3.36 eV to 3.26 eV, decrease in film thickness and refractive index and an increase in extinction coefficient of Zn1 − xCoxO thin films. The change in nature of stress from compressive to tensile with lower to higher doping of Co is corroborative with the angular peak shift of (002) plane of ZnO lattice. An overall increase in microhardness of Zn1 − xCoxO thin films up to x = 0.05 is attributed to change in microstructure and evolution of secondary phase and as the secondary phase separates out the overall stress is released leading to lowering of hardness after this concentration. Hall–Petch behavior is also studied and found to obey until x = 0.05, however, considerable deviation after this dopant concentration is attributed to the increase in the volume fraction of grain boundaries, which results from the secondary phase separation from this dopant concentration.
 
Publisher Elsevier
 
Date 2010-04-28
 
Type Article
PeerReviewed
 
Format application/pdf
 
Identifier http://npl.csircentral.net/200/1/167.pdf
Bahadur, Nupur and Srivastava, A. K. and Kumar, Sushil and M. , Deepa and Nag, Bhavya (2010) Influence of cobalt doping on the crystalline structure, optical and mechanical properties of ZnO thin films. Thin Solid Films, 518 (18). pp. 5257-5264. ISSN 0040-6090
 
Relation http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.tsf.2010.04.113
http://npl.csircentral.net/200/