Characteristics of inkjet-printed nano indium tin oxide particles for transparent conducting electrodes

The electrical and optical properties of indium tin oxide (ITO) films prepared by inkjet-printing of the ITO nano particles were investigated as a function of rapid-thermal annealing temperature for transparent conducting electrode. It was found that the sheet resistance and resistivity of the inkjet-printed ITO film were gradually decreased with increasing the annealing temperature, while the optical transmittance and band gap were kept constant regardless of the annealing temperature. This indicates the necessity of the post annealing process after Inkjet-printing of the ITO nano particles. From the calculated figure of merit value, we were able to obtain the optimized ITO film after rapid-thermal annealing at 450 degrees C due to its low sheet resistance. Preliminary results obtained from the Inkjet-printed ITO films demonstrate that the inkjet-printing is a promising and cost-efficient deposition method for preparing of ITO electrodes at atmospheric pressure. Crown Copyright (C) 2010 Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.