Piezoelectric Properties of Zinc Oxide Films on Glass Substrates Deposited by RF-Magnetron-Mode Electron Cyclotron Resonance Sputtering System

There are various types of electron cyclotron resonance (ECR) sputtering systems, DC-mode, RF-mode, etc. We reported that zinc oxide (ZnO) films on glass substrates deposited by DC-mode ECR and RF-mode ECR sputtering systems had shown excellent piezoelectric properties and c-axis orientations. The RF-mode ECR sputtering system was capable of depositing ZnO films on glass substrates without evidence of column and fiber grains in cross section and driving a 1.1 GHz fundamental Rayleigh surface acoustic wave (SAW). In this paper, the properties of ZnO film deposited by an RF-magnetron-mode ECR sputtering system, which has added magnets to the outside of a cylindrical zinc metal (Zn) target of the RF-mode ECR sputtering system, are investigated. It is confirmed that the SAW filters using ZnO films on an interdigital transducer (IDT)/glass substrate deposited by the RF-magnetron-mode ECR sputtering exhibit almost the same effective electromechanical coupling factors (keff) as the theoretical keff values calculated by finite element method (FEM) using the constants of ZnO single crystal (measured keff values are 97% of the theoretical values) and 0.6 ˜ 3.7 dB lower insertion loss in comparison with the films deposited by the DC-mode ECR and the RF-mode ECR sputtering system.