Effects of Precursor Concentration on Structural and Optical Properties of ZnO Thin Films Grown on Muscovite Mica Substrates by Sol-Gel Spin-Coating.

The structural and optical properties of the ZnO thin films grown on mica substrates for different precursor concentrations were investigated. The surface morphologies of all the samples indicated that they consisted of granular structures with spherical nano-sized crystallites. The thickness of the ZnO thin films increased significantly and the optical band gap exhibited a blue shift with an increase in the precursor concentration. It is remarkable that the highest I(NBE)/I(DLE) ratio was observed for the ZnO thin film with 0.8 M precursor concentration, even though cracks formed on the surface of this film.