Determination of the barrier height of Pt-Ir Schottky nano-contacts on Al-doped ZnO thin films by conductive Atomic Force Microscopy

By means of the I-V characteristics measured at room temperature, the height of the Schottky barrier established by the conductive Pt-Ir tip of an Atomic Force Microscope on the aluminum doped ZnO thin films were estimated in the range of 0.58-0.64 eV. The ideality factors were in the range of 2.11-1.39, respectively. These values are in accordance with those reported by other authors that measured the height of the Pt Schottky barrier on ZnO by means of several methods. The procedure detailed in this work suggests that the scanning time for obtaining I-V Schottky characteristics is of the order of 2 ms.