This paper investigates the nematic liquid crystal (NLC) alignment on ion beam-exposed zinc oxide (ZnO) films The ZnO films are deposited by a radio frequency magnetron sputtering During the deposition of ZnO film we supplied sufficient oxygen gas for high resistivity and transmittance The deposited films show a high transmittance of over 90% and high resistivity of over 10(10)Omega cm The ZnO films show a high deposition rate of 26 7 angstrom/min Images obtained via scanning electron microscopy of the ZnO film surfaces before and after the ion beam exposure show that groove patterns are formed being to be parallel to the ion beam exposure direction LC cells are fabricated with the ion beam-exposed ZnO films The NLC molecules align parallel to the ion beam exposure direction The electro-optic and response characteristics of fabricated cells show the possibility of application to liquid crystal displays (C) 2010 Elsevier B V All rights reserved