Direct electron injection into an oxide insulator using a cathode buffer layer

Injecting charge carriers into the mobile bands of an inorganic oxide insulator (for example, SiO 2 , HfO 2 ) is a highly complicated task, or even impossible without external energy sources such as photons. This is because oxide insulators exhibit very low electron affinity and high ionization energy levels. Here we show that a ZnO layer acting as a cathode buffer layer permits direct electron injection into the conduction bands of various oxide insulators (for example, SiO 2 , Ta 2 O 5 , HfO 2 , Al 2 O 3 ) from a metal cathode. Studies of current–voltage characteristics reveal that the current ohmically passes through the ZnO/oxide-insulator interface. Our findings suggests that the oxide insulators could be used for simply fabricated, transparent and highly stable electronic valves. With this strategy, we demonstrate an electrostatic discharging diode that uses 100-nm SiO 2 as an active layer exhibiting an on/off ratio of ∼10 7 , and protects the ZnO thin-film transistors from high electrical stresses. Carrier injection from a metallic electrode into an oxide insulator component is made difficult by the large energy level offset between the two. Here, the authors show that an intermediary zinc-oxide layer enables an Ohmic electrical contact between a metal and an oxide insulator layer.