Effect of hydrogen doping on ultraviolet emission spectra of various types of ZnO

A pulse-modulated plasma irradiation technique was applied to hydrogenation of ZnO. Three kinds of ZnO samples were employed to investigate the electronic state of hydrogen in ZnO. Secondary-ion-mass-spectroscopy analysis using isotope tracer revealed that the surface layer to 100 nm was doped with hydrogen after the irradiation and its concentration was in the order of ${10}^{16}\hspace{0.17em}{\mathrm{cm}}^{\text{−3}}.$ The efficiency of band edge emission was increased by the hydrogenation. However, the the degree of the improvements depended on impurity and defect concentration in the original samples. It was concluded that hydrogen in ZnO passivates deep donor and acceptor states by electron transfer from hydrogen to the defects.