PROCESSING & CHARACTERISATION OF SEMICONDUCTING NANOSTRUCTURES

Abstract

Nowadays, conservation of energy has become an important subject to be focused, because of the depletion of the fossils fuels we have. Along with, the use of fossils fuels is not cost effective. Various techniques and methodologies have been exploited to conserve the energy to its maximum. At the other end of the scale, there are small amounts of energy that is wasted and needs to be captured. Our aim is not to develop large scale power but to store that small amounts of energy which is wasted during industrial and day to day life processes. 1-lere, nanotechnology provides economical and simple tools to reduce this problem, among which there are several semiconducting nanostructures like ZnO thin films that are extensively explored in this research field. Because of the unique properties that ZnO has, it is now a days the most exploited semiconductor. Due to its crystal geometry, it is shows piezoelectric effect i.e it transforms mechanical energy into electrical energy when pressed. This phenomenon is becoming very - useful in developing low power devices. In the present work, zinc oxide(ZnO) thin film has been used to study the piezoelectric properties present in it. The ZnO thin films were modeled and simulated using the COMSOL 5.0 software. After applying load, the value of the piezoelectric coefficient d33 was calculated which is the direct measurement of current generated. The value of the d33, was found to be increasing with the increase in the thickness of the film. The ZnO thin film has been also fabricated experimentally by using sol gel method The synthesis part involves the preparation of 0.1 M sol using zinc acetate dehydrate and iso-propanol as a precursor material and diethanolamine as a surfactant/stabilizer. The stainless steel SS 316 was used as a substrate for the film deposition. The ZnO film was deposited using spin coater at 3000 rpm for 20 seconds and then annealed at 500°C for 1 hour in presence of air, which were further characterized using X ray diffraction(XRD), atomic force rn icroscopy(AFM), field emission scanning microscope(FE SEM) and Nanoindentation. All these characterization results confirmed the formation of the ZnO thin films, more characterization needs to be done experimentally to compute the value of d33 In brief, simulation results tells that the ZnO can be used effectively in fabricating low power devices which could be used in many public areas for lightening purposes.