Effects of CW CO₂ Laser Annealing on Indium Tin Oxide Thin Films Characteristics

In this work ITO thin film annealing was carried out using a CW CO2 laser beam for ITO thin film annealing over a 1 cm2 area with a temperature higher than 250°C to obtain ITO grains with excellent structural quality thin films. The obtained ITO films were characterized for crystallization, surface morphology, electrical and optical properties, which has theoretical significance and application value. ITO thin films are deposited on glass substrates by sputter coater system (RF) from a high density target (In2O3-SnO2, 90-10 wt%). After deposition, ITO thin films have been irradiated by CW CO2 laser (λ = 10.6 μm) with power ranging from 1 to 10 watt. These films were annealed at temperatures 250°C, 350°C, and 450°C in the air for 20 minutes using different laser power. The main incentive was to develop a low temperature process for ITO thin films, which typically required a 350°C anneal to crystallize and achieve optimum optical and electrical properties. The XRD results showed that 350°C temperature laser annealing could crystallize ITO with a strong (222) preferred orientation and its grain size increased from 29.27 nm to 48.63 nm. The structure, optical transmission, energy gap, resistivity and sheet resistance of the ITO thin films were systematically investigated as a function of laser post annealing temperature. It was found that the lowest resistivity was 2.9 × 10^－4 Ω-cm and that sheet resistance was 14.5 Ω/sq. And the highest optical transmittance (98.65%) of ITO films was obtained at 350°C annealing temperature.