Nanoscale electrical properties of ZnO nanorods grown by chemical bath deposition

Well-aligned zinc oxide nanorod arrays (ZNAs) synthesized using chemical bath deposition were fabricated on a gallium-doped zinc oxide substrate, and the effects of varying the precursor concentrations on the growth and nanoscale electrical properties of the ZNAs were investigated. The as-synthesized ZNAs were characterized using field-emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM), atomic force microscopy (AFM), conducting atomic force microscopy (CAFM), and scanning surface potential microscopy (SSPM). The FESEM and AFM images show that the growth rate in terms of length and diameter is highly sensitive to the precursor concentration. CAFM and SSPM analyses indicate that when concentrations of both the zinc acetate and hexamethylenetetramine solutions were 30 mM, the coverage percentages of the recordable and conducting regions on the ZNA surface were 48.3% and 0.9%, which is suitable for application in resistive random access memory devices.