Meyer-Neldel rule in ZnO

Seventy years ago Meyer and Neldel investigated four polycrystalline n-type conducting ZnO rods [W. Meyer and H. Neldel, Z. Tech. Phys. (Leipzig) 12, 588 (1937)]. The specific conductivity increased exponentially with temperature. A linear relationship between the thermal activation energy for the specific conductivity and the logarithm of the prefactor was observed. Since then thermally activated processes revealing this behavior are said to follow the Meyer-Neldel (MN) rule. We show that the emission of charge carriers from deep electron traps in ZnO follows the MN rule with the isokinetic temperature amounting to 226±4 K.