Crystal orientation control of antimony telluride thermoelectric thin films by oblique deposition

Abstract

We prepared p-type antimony telluride thin films by an oblique deposition at the incident angle ranging from 0º to 80º. We investigated the relationship between the structural and electrical properties of the thin films. As the structural properties, we analyzed cross-section morphology by scanning electron microscope (SEM), and the crystal orientation and crystallite size by x-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis. As the electrical properties, we measured in-plane electrical conductivity, Seebeck coefficient and power factor at room temperature. As a result, we found the thin film at the incident angle of 40° obtained the highest crystal orientation. As the incident angle increased, the crystallite size were enhanced but the power factor decreased. The power factor of thin film at the incident angle of 0° was 1.26 μW / ( cm · K 2 ) and thin film at the incident angle of 80° was 0.38 μW / ( cm · K 2 ).