  ZrO2:10%SiO2 thinfilms have been deposited on fused silica substrate by
reactive electron beam co-evaporation technique at different oxygen partial
pressure. The structural analysis shows tetragonal phase with residual tensile
stress in the films. The intensity of the tetragonal t(110) phase are found
increasing with increasing oxygen pressure. The optical band gap is found
increasing from 5.06 eV to 5.28 eV because of increasing crystalinity of
monoclinic phase, while the film grain size remains almost constant with
increase of oxygen pressure, concludes that the crystallite or grain size has
no effect on the optical properties of the films. The dispersion of the
refractive index is discussed in terms of single oscillator Wimple-DiDomenico
model. The dispersion energy parameter better known as structural order
parameter are found increasing with the intensity of t(110) phase. It is
observed that films having higher value of order parameter show lower surface
roughness which concludes that the local microstructure ordering can
predominantly influence the grain morphology which in turn can lead to better
surface for higher value of order parameter.
