Opto-electronic and morphological alteration in SnO2/Au/SnO2 thin film as a result of 120 MeV Ni10+ irradiation for TCE application

Herein, the study of electrical and morphological properties of SnO
₂
/Au/SnO
₂
thin film is presented. The stacked multilayers were deposited on Si (100) / SiO
₂
substrate by e-beam evaporation using standard SnO
₂
and Au targets to get a total thickness of ~ 75 nm. Aluminum mask was used to create an interface between pristine and 120 MeV Ni
¹⁰⁺
irradiated (fluence-1×10
¹²
and 5×10
¹²
ions/cm
²
) region. Irradiation resulted in an increase in roughness of film from 1.21 nm to 3.03 nm. The current-voltage characteristics taken at pristine irradiated and at the interface of the pristine-irradiated region showed ohmic behavior with the interface showing better conductivity. Hall measurements show decrease in electrical resistivity from 2.2 × 10
^-4
Ω-cm to 1.04 × 10
^-4
Ω-cm post irradiation for films irradiated with 120 MeV 10
¹²
Ni
¹⁰⁺
ions/cm
²
. The optical study shows a decrease in transparency (80.97% to 78.56%) and increases in refractive index post irradiation. The possible mechanism for morphological and optoelectronic variation in the irradiated region is discussed in the manuscript.