TRABAJOS ORIGINALES

Effects of deposition period on the chemical bath deposited Cu₄SnS₄ thin films

Anuar Kassim^*a ; Saravanan Nagalingam^b ; Tan Wee Tee^a and Ho Soon Min^a

a Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science, Universiti Putra Malaysia, 43400 Serdang, Selangor, Malaysia.
b Department of Bioscience and Chemistry, Faculty of Engineering and Science, Universiti Tunku Abdul Rahman, 53300 Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.
* Corresponding author, E-mail: anuar@science.upm.edu.my

ABSTRACT

Cu₄SnS₄ thin films were prepared by simple chemical bath deposition technique. The influence of deposition period on the structural, morphological and optical properties of films was studied. The films were characterized using X-ray diffraction, atomic force microscopy and UV-Vis Spectrophotometer. X-ray diffraction patterns indicated that the films were polycrystalline with prominent peak attributed to (221) plane of orthorhombic crystal structure. The films prepared at 80 min showed significant increased in the intensity of all diffractions. According to AFM images, these films indicated that the surface of substrate was covered completely. The obtained films also produced higher absorption characteristics when compared to the films prepared at other deposition periods based on optical absorption studies. The band gap values of films deposited at different deposition periods were in the range of 1.6-2.1 eV. Deposition for 80 min was found to be the optimum condition to produce good quality thin films under the current conditions.

Key words: Thin film, chemical bath deposition, band gap energy.

INTRODUCTION

Interest on the preparation and study of physical properties of thin film semiconductors for their possible applications in optoelectronic devices, solar cells, infrared detectors and light emitting diodes has been increasing in the recent years. The properties of thin films prepared by different methods are critically dependent on the nature of preparation technique. In the past few decades, several techniques such as chemical bath deposition, vacuum evaporation, electrodeposition, molecular beam epitaxy, close spaced sublimation, thermal evaporation, spray pyrolysis, sputter deposition and plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition have been used in the deposition of thin films. Chemical bath deposition technique is relatively simple, cost effective and can be applied in large area deposition at low temperature. This method does not require vacuum and sophisticated instrumentation.

Consulte el artículo completo en:

http://www.scielo.org.pe/pdf/rsqp/v76n1/a06v76n1.pdf