Optical and electronic properties of reactively sputtered amorphous GeNx:H

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Abstract
Basic photoelectronic properties of hydrogenated amorphous germanium nitride (a‐GeNx:H) are presented for the first time. Amorphous‐GeNx:H films were prepared by an rf reactive sputtering of a Ge target using Ar+N2+H2 mixed gases and their optical band gaps were controlled continuously in the range from 1.0 to 3.3 eV by varying the compositional ratio of nitrogen to germanium. In contrast to H‐free a‐GeNx, the temperature dependence of the dark conductivity of a‐GeNx:H shows that thermally activated band conduction prevails in the carrier transport over a wide temperature range at least down to 180 K. The photo‐to‐dark conductivity ratio under AM1 light of unoptimized a‐GeNx:H amounts to 40.