Ethyl Zinc β-Ketoiminates and β-Amidoenoates: Influence of Precursor Design on the Properties of Highly Conductive Zinc Oxide Thin Films from Aerosol-Assisted Chemical Vapour Deposition.

Highly transparent (>85 %) and conductive (1.086×10  Ω cm) zinc oxide thin films have been deposited from specifically selected precursors allowing us to establish a direct correlation between their molecular structure and the optoelectronic properties of the deposited films. Mono-ligated ethyl zinc compounds of varying steric bulk: [EtZn(OC(Me)CH(Me)N( Pr))] (1), [EtZn(OC(OEt)CH(Me)N( Pr))] (2) and [EtZn(OC(OEt)CH(CH )N(Dipp))] (3) were compared with the related bis-ligated zinc complexes [Zn(OC(Me)CH(Me)N( Pr)) ] (4), [Zn(OC(OEt)CH(Me)N( Pr)) ] (5) and [Zn(OC(OEt)CH(Me)N(Dipp)) ] (6). In all cases bulkier ligands resulted in poorer electronic properties of deposited films, whilst all mono-ligated compounds were shown as superior precursors. All complexes were characterised by H and C{ H} NMR and elemental analysis, with the structure of 6 determined by single crystal X-ray diffraction. Zinc oxide films were deposited from single and dual source (with methanol) reactions of these precursors, and analysed via XRD, XPS and EDX. Optoelectronic properties were investigated through UV/vis spectroscopy and Hall effect measurements, and morphology was examined via SEM. Tauc plots from UV/vis data indicated that Film A showed the lowest band gap of 3.31 eV. Varying the elemental composition of the precursors led to changes in the elemental composition of the resultant films, as well as changes in their structural and optoelectronic properties. Using this approach of precursor design, we have been able to tune single source precursors towards zinc oxide to deposit films with specific properties.