ZnO films have been grown on a-plane sapphire substrates by metalorganic vapor-phase epitaxy using diisopropylzinc as a zinc source and iso-propanol or tertiary-butanol as oxygen sources. The growth temperature and pressure were 300–500°C and 76Torr, respectively. The samples were characterized by photoluminescence, Hall-effect measurements, X-ray diffraction and Raman spectroscopy. When tertiary butanol was used as the oxygen source under high VI/II conditions, distinctive peaks were observed at 3.29eV and 1550cm −1 in the photoluminescence and Raman spectra, respectively.