A review of various single layer, bilayer, and multilayer TCO materials and their applications

Since fabricating the first transparent conductive oxide (TCO) material, several investigations and applications have been reported in such fields as portable and flexible electronics, solar cells and sensors about this material. This wide range of applications is because of the immense potential in this area and the demands for new devices and technologies. TCOs are used in many areas, such as energy generation, energy-saving, and sensors. In this review, various types of single-layer, bilayer and multilayer TCO materials and their optical and electrical properties, various deposition techniques and applications are investigated. It is shown how manipulation of effective parameters such as doping, growth method and temperature can change the electrical and optical properties. This can lead researchers to proper control on TCO fabricated layers to improve them in their desired context.