Hydrogen had been proposed to be one of the contributors to the native n-type doping in as-grown zinc oxide and might also be used as an intentional n-type dopant. Secondary ion mass spectrometry was used here to study deuterium diffusion profiles in single crystalline ZnO. The samples used were hydrothermally grown, high-resistive (10kΩcm) monocrystalline ZnO implanted with deuterium to a dose of 1015/cm2, yielding a peak concentration of approximately 5 x 1018/cm3 at a depth of 2.2μm. Diffusion profiles were studied after 0.5h isochronal heat treatments from 100 up to 400C in steps of 50C. The observed redistribution could be explained by employing a diffusion model which included trapping of 2H by Li-impurities and an activation energy of 0.85eV was extracted for the diffusion of 2H.

Hydrogen Migration in Single Crystalline ZnO. Johansen, K.M.H., Christensen, J.S., Monakhov, E.V., Kuznetsov, A.Y., Svensson, B.G.: Materials Research Society Symposium Proceedings, 2008, 1035, 46-51