Investigations of ZnO thin films deposited by a reactive pulsed laser ablation

Highly transparent ZnO thin films were deposited at different substrate temperatures by pulsed laser deposition in an oxygen atmosphere. The thin films were characterized by various techniques including X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, optical absorption, and photoluminescence. We demonstrated that oriented wurtzite ZnO thin films could be deposited at room temperature using a high purity zinc target. Variable temperature photoluminescence revealed new characteristics in the band edge emission. The underlying mechanism for the observed phenomena was also discussed.