Role Of Near-Surface States In Ohmic-Schottky Conversion Of Au Contacts To Zno

A conversion from ohmic to rectifying behavior is observed for Au contacts on atomically ordered polar ZnO surfaces following remote, room-temperature oxygen plasma treatment. This transition is accompanied by reduction of the "green" deep level cathodoluminescence emission, suppression of the hydrogen donor-bound exciton photoluminescence and a similar to 0.75 eV increase in n-type band bending observed via x-ray photoemission. These results demonstrate that the contact type conversion involves more than one mechanism, specifically, removal of the adsorbate-induced accumulation layer plus lowered tunneling due to reduction of near-surface donor density and defect-assisted hopping transport. (c) 2005 American Institute of Physics.