The Influence of Different Complexing Agents on the Properties of SILAR-Deposited Cobalt Selenide Thin Films

Abstract

The nanostructured thin films have good physical properties, and could be used in the various applications such as capacitor, photo detector, ultra violet opto electronics, light emitting diode, photonic integrated circuit and solar cell applications. The successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method is one of the common chemical deposition techniques. This method has many advantages such as the simplest & the cheapest method, and required low temperature deposition process. This is the first time, preparation of cobalt selenide thin films onto soda lime glass slide at room temperature in the presence of various complexing agents (ammonia, triethanolamine and ethylenediaminetetraacetic acid disodium salt). Characterization of thin films was carried by using x-ray diffraction, atomic force microscopy and UV-visible spectrophotometer. AFM analysis showed that the cobalt selenide thin films prepared in the presence of ammonia exhibited uniform and completely covered the entire surface area of substrate. XRD data confirmed that obtained thin films (using ammonia and triethanolamine) were polycrystalline with well-developed phases. Optical properties indicated the band gap values of all films were in the range of 1.8 to 2 eV, suitable to be used in solar cell applications.