Rich Variety of Defects in ZnO via an Attractive Interaction between O Vacancies and Zn Interstitials: Origin of<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mi>n</mml:mi></mml:math>-Type Doping

Abstract

As the concentration of intrinsic defects becomes sufficiently high in O-deficient ZnO, interactions between defects lead to a significant reduction in their formation energies. We show that the formation of both O vacancies and Zn interstitials becomes significantly enhanced by a strong attractive interaction between them, making these defects an important source of n-type conductivity in ZnO.