Surface Treatment of ITO (Indium-Tin-Oxide) thin Films Prepared by Sol-Gel Process

ITO (Indium-tin oxide) thin films have been prepared by a sol-gel spinning coating method and fired and annealed in the temperature range of 450-600℃. The XRD patterns of the films indicated the main peak of (222) plane and showed higher crystallinity with increasing an annealing temperature. The surface of the ITO thin films were treated with 0.1 N HCl 20% solution at room temperature. The effects of surface treatment on electrical properties and surface morphologies of the ITO films were investigated with the results of sheet resistance and FE-SEM, AFM images. The samples, subsequently treated with acidic solution for 40 sec showed the sheet resistance of 0.982 ㏀/square. The surface treatment using acidic solution diminished the RMS (root mean square) value and the residual carbon content of the ITO films. It seemed that the acid-cleaning of the ITO thin films lead to the decrease of surface roughness and sheet resistance.