Preparation and characterization of zirconium-doped indium oxide conducting films with high infrared transparency

This work reports the zirconium-doped indium oxide (IZRO) transparent conductive thin films on infrared optical quartz glass (JGS-3) substrates via room-temperature RF magnetron sputtering. The effects of annealing temperature and oxygen flow ratio on electrical and optical properties were systematically investigated. The optimized IZRO film with 3 sccm oxygen flow and 700 °C annealing temperatures exhibited an average optical transmittance of 91.5% in the wavelength of 1300–1550 nm and a minimum resistivity of 1.37 × 10−3 Ω·cm with a carrier concentration of 2.46 × 1020 cm−3. The results of x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy revealed that the enhanced electrical conductivity can be attributed to the activation of Zr doping through high-temperature annealing. Meanwhile, the structural and morphological properties of the obtained films were investigated in detail. The IZRO films have potential in the field of short-wave infrared (SWIR) optoelectronic devices due to their SWIR transparent conductive properties.