Pulsed laser deposition in a delayed-double beam configuration is used to incorporate in situ Al in ZnO thin films. In this configuration, two synchronized pulsed-laser beams are employed to ablate independently a ZnO and an Al target. We investigated the effects of relative time delay of plasma plumes on the composition of the films with the aim of evaluating the performance of this technique to produce doped materials. Relative delay between plumes was found to control the incorporation of Al in the film in the range from 14% to 30%. However, to produce low impurity concentration of Al-doped ZnO (with Al incorporation less than 2%) the fluence used to produce the plasmas has more influence over the film composition than the relative plume delay. The minimum incorporation of Al corresponded to a relative delay of 0 mu s, due to the interaction between plumes during their expansion. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.