Thin Solid Films最新文献

{"title":"Enhanced structural, optical, electrical, photocatalytic, and scavengers test of Er-doped ZnO thin films via dip coating for optoelectronic and environmental applications under UV and sunlight exposure","authors":"Romaissa Allouche ,&nbsp;Sabrina Roguai ,&nbsp;Abdelkader Djelloul ,&nbsp;Najoua Turki Kamoun","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140718","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140718","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>This study explores the impact of erbium (Er) doping on the structural, optical, electrical, and photocatalytic properties of ZnO thin films synthesized via the sol-gel dip-coating method. X-ray diffraction (XRD) confirms a hexagonal wurtzite structure, with peak shifts indicating strain induced by Er incorporation. Notably, a secondary Er-related phase emerges at higher doping levels (10 % and 15 %), suggesting the solubility limit of Er in the ZnO matrix. Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) reveals that moderate doping (2–5 %) improves film uniformity, while excessive Er content (10 % and above) leads to porosity and grain boundary defects. Photoluminescence (PL) spectra show enhanced near-band-edge (NBE) emission (405–416 nm) with increasing Er content, peaking at 15 %, while defect-related emissions (486 nm and 528 nm) indicate changes in charge trapping mechanisms. Electrical analysis via impedance spectroscopy demonstrates improved conductivity, with a decrease in parallel resistance (Rp) up to 10 % Er, followed by an increase at 15 % due to excess defect formation. Photocatalytic experiments using methylene blue (MB) under UV and sunlight irradiation reveal enhanced degradation efficiency, with 2 % Er-doped ZnO performing best under UV light and 10 % Er showing optimal performance under sunlight. Kinetic analysis follows a pseudo-first-order reaction model, Scavenger experiments confirm that hydroxyl radicals (•OH) playing a dominant role under UV irradiation. These results highlight the critical role of Er solubility in tuning ZnO’s properties, making Er-doped ZnO a promising material for optoelectronic applications and environmental remediation.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140718"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144263170","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"High-efficiency low-temperature active screen plasma nitriding by bias voltage optimization of Ti-6Al-4V titanium alloy","authors":"Tao Lai ,&nbsp;Hong Gao ,&nbsp;Yan Gao","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140717","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140717","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Nitriding at low temperatures can prevent the deterioration of mechanical properties by grain growth of metal substrate. However, the formation of a sufficiently thick nitride layer under these conditions remains challenging because of the inherently slow diffusion kinetics. This study presents an efficient active screen plasma nitriding (ASPN) technique applied to a Ti-6Al-4V titanium alloy at low temperatures of 500–600 °C without requiring any supplementary deformation processes. The effects of different bias voltages (400 V and 800 V) on the nitriding behavior within the temperature range of 500–600 °C were comprehensively assessed. A compound layer exceeding 6 μm was formed on the surface of the Ti-6Al-4V titanium alloy after 20 h of nitriding at a low temperature of 600 °C, significantly outperforming conventional plasma nitriding techniques. The optimization of bias voltage greatly enhanced the efficiency of the ASPN process. The study also investigated how the bias voltage influences the ASPN process. Appropriate bias voltages facilitated the migration of nitriding species toward the sample surface and promoted nitride layer growth. However, excessively high bias voltages intensified the ion bombardment, increasing the etching effect on the TiN deposition layer. An optimal bias voltage of 400 V best balanced the deposition and sputter-etching of nitride species during the ASPN treatment of the Ti-6Al-4V titanium alloy.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140717"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144263171","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Enhanced mechanical and tribological performance of W/B4C periodic nano-multilayer coating by optimizing W deposition power","authors":"Mingfeng Li ,&nbsp;Yuzhen Liu ,&nbsp;Dae-Eun Kim ,&nbsp;Oleksiy V. Penkov","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140716","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140716","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Tungsten/Boron Carbide (W/B₄C) periodic nano-multilayer coatings (PNCs) were deposited by pulse DC magnetron sputtering; the effect of W sputtering power on the structure and tribological performance of PNCs was investigated with W power ranging from 15 to 50 Watts. The highest mechanical and tribological performance was achieved at a deposition rate of 35 Watts, and these properties were attributed to high uniformity, high compactness, and low intermixing of the PNC. Besides, the formation of graphitization on the surface of the wear track was observed, which was also the reason for the wear reduction of the W/B₄C PNC coating. The W deposition power should be adjusted to a suitable range to obtain a coating with superior mechanical and tribological performance.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140716"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144254942","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Electrode dependent asymmetric memory switching behaviour of Cu2FeSnS4 based devices","authors":"N. Aravind,&nbsp;Neju Mathew Philip,&nbsp;M. C. Santhosh Kumar","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140715","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140715","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Cu₂FeSnS₄ (CFTS) is a promising and relatively lesser explored materials in the family of copper-based chalcogenides. The material has earth-abundant constituent elements, which make it cheap, while also being non-toxic in nature. This work intends to explore the memory switching properties of CFTS based thin film devices coated on Fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) substrates with different top electrodes – Silver (Ag) and Aluminium (Al). We report a comparative study on the performances of &lt;FTO/CFTS/Ag&gt; and &lt;FTO/CFTS/Al&gt; devices. CFTS thin films were deposited onto FTO coated glass substrates using vacuum spray pyrolysis at 375°C. X-ray diffraction analysis confirmed the formation of tetragonal kesterite structure of the material. Field Emission Scanning Electron Microscopy with Energy Dispersive X-ray analysis was used to investigate the morphology and elemental composition. Current (I)- voltage (V) measurements show that the devices exhibit asymmetric memory switching characteristics, with substantially high ON/OFF ratio of 272 for &lt;FTO/CFTS/Ag&gt; device and 115 for &lt;FTO/CFTS/Al&gt; device with good endurance over a range of 100 cycles. The switching mechanisms at different voltage ranges are analysed from the double logarithmic I-V graphs.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140715"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144254943","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Effect of atomic-layer-deposition sequence on the composition of indium-zinc-tin oxide thin films and its effect on thin-film transistor characteristics","authors":"Yurim Jeong,&nbsp;Chang-Yun Na,&nbsp;Sung Min Cho","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140714","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140714","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Indium-zinc-tin oxide (IZTO) thin films were deposited via atomic layer deposition (ALD) using In and Sn precursors that have not been reported yet. The temperature ranges in which ALD of In₂O₃, ZnO, and SnO₂ thin films was possible were determined, and the IZTO thin films were deposited at 170°C, which all ranges overlap. The In₂O₃, ZnO, and SnO₂ thin films deposited by ALD showed a composition that was almost stoichiometric. The effect of the deposition order of three metal oxides on the composition of IZTO was investigated. It was found that the deposition of ZnO was inhibited when ZnO ALD was performed immediately after SnO₂ ALD. Therefore, the preferred ALD sequence for IZTO thin films is SnO₂, In₂O₃, and ZnO. In one supercycle for IZTO ALD, the number of subcycles of In₂O₃ was fixed to 1 and the number of subcycles of ZnO and SnO₂ was varied, and the changes in the electrical properties of IZTO were observed. Two IZTO compositions exhibiting distinctly different electrical characteristics were selected and applied to the upper and lower channels of a dual-channel IZTO thin-film transistor (TFT). By controlling the position and thickness of two IZTO channel layers with different characteristics, it was shown that a TFT with constructively combined characteristics is possible by collecting only the excellent electrical characteristics of each IZTO channel layer.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140714"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-07","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144263169","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Impact of ambient oxygen pressure on the structural and optical properties of NiO thin films deposited using pulsed laser deposition and the performance of self-driven p-NiO/n-Si as UV–Visible-NIR photodetectors","authors":"Savita Chaoudhary ,&nbsp;A.R. Midhun ,&nbsp;Brahim Aïssa ,&nbsp;Vipul Rastogi ,&nbsp;Anirban Mitra","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140703","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140703","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The stoichiometry of a metal oxide thin film has excellent potential to modify the material’ s physical properties and hence, the device’ s performance. In this paper, an in-depth investigation has been conducted to understand the impact of ambient oxygen pressure (AOP) during Pulsed laser deposition on the structural and optical properties of NiO thin films and its consequences on the self-driven UV–Visible-NIR photodetection properties of the NiO/Si heterostructure. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy results confirm that the Ni vacancy increases with the increase of AOP. Furthermore, a comparative study of spectroscopic ellipsometry and first-principles density functional theory + U calculations is conducted to better understand the impact of different AOP conditions. Our experimental and theoretical results show that while nickel vacancy is an efficient acceptor in NiO, it also reduces transparency in the visible region of the material. In addition, the effects of AOP on the NiO/Si heterojunction-based photodetector’s performance were studied in the broad range from UV to NIR. The stability of the broadband self-powered photodetectors are ensured by periodically switching the photo-illumination at regular time intervals. After tuning the AOP during growth, a highly stable and fast-switching self-biased p-NiO/n-Si photodiode is achieved with the highest responsivity of 32 mA/W upon exposure to 455 nm wavelength.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"824 ","pages":"Article 140703"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144241781","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Correlating the growth characteristics with the optical and structural properties of atomic layer deposited zinc tin oxide","authors":"Poorani Gnanasambandan ,&nbsp;Noureddine Adjeroud ,&nbsp;Renaud Leturcq","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140677","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140677","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>Zinc tin oxide (ZTO) films with precise Sn content is of strong interest for the development of channel layers for amorphous oxide based thin film transistors and buffer layers on copper–indium–gallium–sulfide solar cells. Atomic layer deposition (ALD) has been effectively used for buffer layers with appropriate electronic properties, still an in-depth understanding correlating the structural and functional properties with the growth of the ternary oxide remains to be addressed. Here we investigate the mixing of ZnO and <span><math><msub><mrow><mi>SnO</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>x</mi></mrow></msub></math></span> on the growth and resulting opto-electronic properties by varying the supercycle parameters (cycle ratio and bilayer period) of the ALD process. We show that the growth of ZnO on <span><math><msub><mrow><mi>SnO</mi></mrow><mrow><mi>x</mi></mrow></msub></math></span> in ZTO thinfilms is more complex than a simple substrate-inhibited growth model. Moreover, we demonstrate a strong dependence of the optical properties with the mixed nature of the films as the optical properties of the film not only depend on the Sn content, but also on the bilayer period at a given Sn content. More specifically, the band-gap for a given Sn composition is high for the well-mixed material at the smallest bilayer period, starts decreasing slightly for bilayer periods between 10–20 and falls to the band-gap of ZnO as bilayer period increases further <span><math><mo>&gt;</mo></math></span>40. With the change in ZTO films from well-mixed to multilayer material as the bilayer period is varied, we illustrate that the optical properties of ZTO can be tuned effectively without largely altering the composition.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"825 ","pages":"Article 140677"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144307613","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Engineering nanostructured ZnSe thin films by Gamma irradiation","authors":"Tripti Gupta ,&nbsp;Jaspreet Kaur ,&nbsp;Annu Sharma ,&nbsp;R.P. Chauhan","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140713","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140713","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>In radiation ambiance, the studies on radiation interaction with materials are imperative to have their technological applications in medical and research fields. Also, defect engineering is of profound inquisitiveness to 2-dimensional materials community. The present work aims at estimating the sensitivity of ZnSe thin films for dosimetry applications. Thus, the effects of high-dose gamma (γ) rays are explored for their structural, surface, morphological, optical, and electrical characteristics on ZnSe thin films grown on glass substrates. From XRD (X-ray Diffraction) analyses, a decrease in crystallite sizes is obtained indicating an enhancement of defects. The optical characterization of irradiated thin films shows the bandgap variation; parameters such as extinction coefficient and refractive index have also been extracted. Electrical measurements were also carried out to study thin film’s sensitivity towards different γ doses. Physical alterations that the material undergoes with irradiation can be exploited for γ dosimetry applications. The modifications induced via γ-irradiation in structural, morphological, optical, surface, and electrical have been anatomized.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"824 ","pages":"Article 140713"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144241291","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Ultra-thin inorganic oxide and nitride films as an alternative blocking layer for electrochemical sensors","authors":"Adam McHenry ,&nbsp;Grant Jolly ,&nbsp;Thomas Young ,&nbsp;Michael Brothers ,&nbsp;Victoria Coyle ,&nbsp;Steve Kim ,&nbsp;Jason Heikenfeld","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140712","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140712","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>The desire to translate biosensors for real time molecular monitoring has intensified due to the commercial success of 2-week continuous glucose monitors. However, a common limitation for emerging biosensors is that their lifetimes are often too short for commercially expected benchmarks of at least 3-day and ideally 2-week operation. Electrochemical sensors remain the preferred format of biochemical sensing thanks to their low cost, size, weight, and power requirements for mobile deployment. When exposed to biological fluid, all electrochemical sensors require a blocking layer to protect the electrode surface from fouling and redox interferents. Traditional blocking layer approaches rely on self-assembled monolayers which are often fragile to biological interferents like proteins and require specific electrode materials to improve their stability. Presented here is an evaluation of ultra-thin inorganic oxide and nitride films as an alternative to self-assembled monolayer blocking layers. Specifically, silicon oxide, silicon nitride, and aluminum oxide films were deposited by electron beam evaporation or atomic layer deposition at thicknesses of several nanometers to mimic the electrical capacitance of a conventional monolayer blocking layer. These oxide films were characterized over 7-days and demonstrated to provide poor protection against interfering redox currents from dissolved ferricyanide (150 - 300 µA/cm2) and oxygen reduction interference (30 - 60 µA/cm2). The oxide films were then used as a blocking layer in an electrochemical aptamer sensor using the previously published aptamer for phenylalanine. The phenylalanine sensor showed a binding affinity stronger than found in literature, but a reduced signal gain (∼ 20 % change in methylene blue redox current compared to the expected 50 % previously published on gold). It is speculated and supported by literature that these oxide and nitride films gradually dissolve over periods of days in an aqueous environment. Results further show that if lower quality oxide or nitride films are used, they may be more stable, but at the cost of initially higher in currents. While oxide and nitride films fail to improve upon the performance of thiol-blocking layers on gold electrodes, they may provide utility in some applications by allowing for alternate electrode materials and surfaces to be used instead of traditional self-assembled monolayers on gold electrodes.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"824 ","pages":"Article 140712"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144241783","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Vortex critical velocities in metallic-capped epitaxial NbN thin films","authors":"J.C. Zapata ,&nbsp;Yeonkyu Lee ,&nbsp;Jeehoon Kim ,&nbsp;N. Haberkorn","doi":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140710","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.tsf.2025.140710","url":null,"abstract":"<div><div>We report the impact of proximity effects induced by different capping layers on the vortex dynamics and Larkin-Ovchinnikov instability in epitaxial NbN thin films. Bilayers consisting of 5 nm and 10 nm thick NbN were combined with capping layers of magnetic 5 nm thick Fe_0.2Ni_0.8 and non-magnetic 5 nm thick Al and 10 nm thick Pt. The critical temperature (<em>T_c</em>), which is approximately 16 K in pure samples, decreases due to the influence of the capping layers. This reduction is more pronounced for Fe_0.2Ni_0.8, where <em>T_c</em> is fully suppressed for 5 nm thick NbN and decreases to 10.1 K for 10 nm thick films. Additionally, <em>T_c</em> is restored when an ultrathin AlN insulating layer is introduced, preventing electronic interaction. In contrast, Al and Pt capping layers also reduce <em>T_c</em>, but to a lesser extent compared to magnetic layers. By performing current-voltage curves, we determined the vortex critical velocities as a function of the magnetic field. Initially, the velocities start at approximately 6 km/s at low fields, subsequently decreasing to values between 1.8–2.8 km/s at fields around 1 T While a negligible impact is observed at low fields, the velocities at moderate and high fields tend to increase near <em>T_c</em> for non-magnetic capping layers. These increases (approximately 20 %) may be attributed to changes in the quasiparticle relaxation time, likely due to phonon escape contributions, as well as modifications in the electron diffusion coefficient and heat dissipation to local heating generated by inhomogeneities. Comparatively, the impact of capping layers is significantly smaller than previously reported for NbN and other disordered superconductors, where the initial vortex velocities in pure films were much lower than those observed in the films used in this study.</div></div>","PeriodicalId":23182,"journal":{"name":"Thin Solid Films","volume":"824 ","pages":"Article 140710"},"PeriodicalIF":2.0,"publicationDate":"2025-06-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"144203964","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"材料科学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}