Purohit 2021
Purohit 2021
Purohit 2021
https://doi.org/10.1007/s40195-021-01266-6
Received: 24 December 2020 / Revised: 29 April 2021 / Accepted: 10 May 2021 / Published online: 29 June 2021
© The Chinese Society for Metals (CSM) and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2021
Abstract
A typical high-efficiency solar cell device needs the best lattice matching between different constituent layers to mitigate
the open-circuit voltage loss. In the present work, the physical properties of CdS thin films are investigated where films
with 100 nm thickness were fabricated on the different types of substrates viz. soda–lime glass, indium-doped tin oxide
(ITO)- and fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO)-coated glass substrates, and silicon wafer using electron beam evaporation. The
X-ray diffraction patterns confirmed that deposited thin films showed cubic phase and had (111) as predominant orienta-
tion where the structural parameters were observed to be varied with nature of substrates. The ohmic behaviour of the CdS
films was disclosed by current–voltage characteristics, whereas the scanning electron microscopy micrograph revealed the
uniform deposition of the CdS films with the presence of round-shaped grains. The elemental analysis confirmed the CdS
films deposition where the Cd/S weight percentage ratio was changed with nature of substrates. The direct energy band gap
was observed in the 1.63–2.50 eV range for the films grown on different substrates. The investigated properties of thin CdS
layers demonstrated that the selection of substrate (in terms of nature) during device fabrication plays a crucial role.
Keywords CdS thin films · Substrate evolution · E-beam evaporation · Microstructural properties · Optoelectrical
properties
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1308 A. Purohit et al.
Research is being pursued on CdS thin films due to their order to develop the heterostructure solar cells [45]. Despite
wide energy band gap (2.42 eV), high light sensitivity, low of relatively higher lattice mismatch, the CdS films are
absorption coefficient, high transparency, and high electron widely grown on ITO and FTO substrates in fabrication of
affinity, which allow it in various optoelectronic applications CdTe/CdS superstrate solar cell devices as these substrates
[8–11]. It possesses n-type semiconducting nature owing efficiently work as transparent electrodes. Besides the above,
to the existence of high sulphur vacancies and interstitial the plastic foil, polymer (low-density polyethylene) [46],
cadmium atoms, while the crystalline phase may be changed polyimide (PI) [42], quartz [41], Ti foils [47], polycarbonate
from cubic to hexagonal with air annealing at 300–350 °C, (PC), polyethylene terephthalate (PET) [40], Si nanoporous
where the cubic phase of CdS is preferred for optoelec- pillar array (Si-NPA) [39], aluminium, platinum, molybde-
tronic devices, and the hexagonal phase of CdS is suitable num [48], etc. have also been used as substrates for the CdS
for solar cell applications [12–15]. The CdS thin films could thin films.
be deposited by several physical and chemical routes based With consideration that the performance of CdTe/CdS
techniques which include chemical bath deposition [15], solar cells can be improved by the use of enhanced quality
electron beam (e-beam) evaporation [16], pulsed laser depo- CdS optical window where the properties of CdS films could
sition [17], sol–gel [18], electro-deposition [19], sputtering be modified by different substrates, and consequently, the
[20–22], atomic layer deposition [23], etc. Among these, the present article is devoted to the well-ordered study on micro-
e-beam evaporation technique has key benefits compared to structural and optoelectrical properties in correlation with
the others which include high purity and homogeneity of the elemental properties of evaporated CdS thin films grown
the grown films, control over the growth rate, etc. [24–26]. on different substrates viz. glass, ITO, FTO and Si wafer fol-
The films developed by this technique usually show high lowed by undertaking microstructural and optical properties
stoichiometry, stability, and durability. The e-beam evapora- with substrate evolution to implicate as optical window or
tion technique maintains the homogeneity of films even at electron transport layer in the technologies concerned.
a lower thickness of the films. It also offers flexible doping
possibility, least contamination, and highly adhesive and
dense films [27] compared to other deposition techniques.
Since the properties of thin films are influenced by depo- 2 Experimental
sition techniques and respective parameters, nature of sub-
strates, doping, annealing temperature and atmosphere, layer The CdS powder with a purity of 5 N was procured from
thickness, etc., therefore, extensive studies have been carried Sigma-Aldrich, and thin films with 100 nm thickness were
out on the CdS thin films [28–37]. Among these, the nature deposited on soda–lime glass, and ITO- and FTO-coated
of substrate is also crucial factor as the used substrate not substrates as well as on Si wafer (having < 111 > plane and
only provides mechanical support to thin films but it also n-type electrical conductivity) using an e-beam evaporation
plays a vital role in the modification of various physical (Model-HHV box coater BC-300) process at room tem-
properties. An ideal or typical substrate should inert and perature. Prior to the deposition, all these substrates were
not react with the growing thin films. There should be the washed by deionized water, acetone, isopropyl alcohol using
least thermal and lattice mismatching between the grown an ultrasonication bath followed by desiccation. A schematic
layer and substrate concerned. block diagram of e-beam evaporation method is shown in
The thin film growth process includes nucleation, coa- Fig. 1.
lescence, channels, holes, and continuous deposition [38] The evaporating CdS material (in pellet form) is placed
where underlying substrate induces different morphologies in a graphite crucible and the substrates are kept fixed on
which is a consequence of atomic deposition on the surface the holder, which were rotated to get uniform deposition
of substrate concerned and relaxation of surface profile [39]. of the films. The vacuum chamber was evacuated up to
The major challenges in deposition of CdS thin films on 2 × 10–6 mbar by using a combination of diffusion and rotary
different substrates include achievement of homogeneous pumps, then the CdS material was bombarded with high
and uniform deposition [40, 41], higher transmittance (in energy electron beam (having energy in range of 5–20 kV)
visible region) with large band gap, least lattice and thermal emitted from an electron gun. The heating of the acceler-
mismatch with the underneath substrates and selection of ated e-beam with evaporating CdS source material resulted
the substrates which uptake low moisture and release high into its evaporation. Consequently, the evaporants are moved
moisture [42], etc. towards substrates and condensed on these followed by films
The CdS films can be grown on different substrates viz. growth as per prevalent mechanism. An in-house quartz
soda–lime glass, ITO, FTO, silicon, etc. The silicon is may crystal monitor was used to measure the final films thick-
be used as substrates for CdS films [41, 43, 44] and the crys- ness as 100 nm whereas the growth rate was kept almost
talline silicon (c-Si) as p-type counterpart to n-type CdS in constant (5–6 Å/s).
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Substrate Evolution to Microstructural and Optoelectrical Properties of Evaporated CdS Thin… 1309
2.2 Optoelectrical Analysis
t 𝜀i = 2ink. (11)
N= , (5)
D3
In order to perform the electrical measurements, the con-
tacts on FTO and Si wafer substrates were made in sandwich
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1310 A. Purohit et al.
structure (i.e. one contact on un-deposited substrate’s sur- 3 Results and Discussion
face and other one on film’s surface) using adhesive silver
paste (Sigma-Aldrich made). The measurements were under- 3.1 Structural Analysis
taken using an Agilent B2901A source meter comprised of
SMU software. The XRD patterns of the CdS films are depicted in Fig. 2
(a–d) wherein the sharp diffraction peak corresponding
2.3 Surface Morphology and Elemental Analysis to (111) orientation is observed at 2θ positions of 26.54°,
26.52°, 26.64°, and 26.36° for CdS thin films grown on
The surface morphological analysis of the CdS films grown soda–lime glass, ITO- and FTO-coated glass substrates,
on the glass substrate was done by scanning electron micros- and silicon wafer, respectively (JCPDS data file num-
copy (SEM, Model Raith), while elemental analysis for the ber 10–0454). The similar (111) preferred orientation is
CdS films grown on glass, ITO, and FTO substrates was car- obtained for e-beam evaporated CdS films grown on differ-
ried out by the energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectroscopy. ent substrates [33]. The identified cubic (111) orientation of
CdS films near 26° is in consistent with the earlier published
reports where CdS films were developed on glass and Si
wafer substrates [55, 56]. Another peak having (222) ori-
entation is found at 54.62° for the CdS thin films deposited
on FTO substrate.
Fig.2 XRD patterns of thin CdS films deposited on a soda–lime glass, b ITO-coated glass, c FTO-coated glass, d silicon wafer substrates
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Substrate Evolution to Microstructural and Optoelectrical Properties of Evaporated CdS Thin… 1311
In XRD patterns, ‘*’ and ‘#’ represent the peaks cor- may be due to the inclusion of impurity atoms [59]. The
responding to used substrates. The intensity of (111)C pre- crystallite size (D) was found to be in range of 23–37 nm and
ferred orientation for the films grown on the FTO substrate observed maximum for the CdS films developed on FTO-
is higher as compared to the films grown on ITO and Si coated glass substrate due to its lower FWHM which might
wafer while the maximum intensity is observed for the CdS be owing to the higher surface smoothening as compared
thin films on the glass substrate which indicated the better to others [60], which indicated higher degree of nucleation,
crystallinity of films deposited on the glass and FTO sub- huge structural refinements, and greater crystalline quality
strates as compared to the others. The observed variation [59, 61].
in intensity of the thin CdS films might be due to different The internal strain (ε) is defined as the lattice disarrange-
adhesive nature of the CdS material on different substrates ment and found in the range (4.19–6.78) × 10−3, while the
as well as mismatching in lattice and thermal coefficients of number of crystallites in the unit area (N) and dislocation
CdS material and underneath used substrate concerned [57]. density (δ) were observed to be changed with the nature
The development of a cubic phase with the F 4̄ 3 m space of substrates due to alteration in respective crystallite size
group is suitable for optoelectronic devices [14]. (D) and lattice constants of the material to the underlying
The structural parameters were calculated corresponding substrates too [62, 63]. The observed XRD patterns and
to the (111)C preferred orientation and are summarized in determined structural constants showed that the nature of
Table 1. The lattice constant (a) and inter-planar spacing substrates plays a crucial role in enhancing the structural
(d) are found in the range of 5.78–5.83 Å and 3.34–3.37 Å, properties of the deposited thin CdS films.
respectively, which agreed well with the standard JCPDS
data. The lattice constant of CdS films grown on glass, ITO 3.2 Optoelectrical Analysis
and FTO substrates is slightly lower than that of the stand-
ard lattice constant (5.82 Å) which might be possible due The transmittance and absorbance spectra of the developed
to the formation of sulphur vacancies in these films [58] as thin CdS films are presented in Fig. 3. The CdS thin films
observed in the elemental analysis. The CdS films grown show high absorbance in the 380–500 nm range of the vis-
on Si wafer showed slightly higher lattice constant which ible region (Fig. 3a) as compared to the upper wavelength
Table 1 Structural constants of Substrate 2θ (deg.) a (Å) d (Å) D (nm) ε × 10–3 δ × 1011 cm−2 N × 1012 cm−2
CdS films grown on different
substrates Glass 26.54 5.79 3.35 25 6.43 1.60 0.64
ITO 26.52 5.79 3.35 23 6.78 1.89 0.82
FTO 26.64 5.78 3.34 37 4.19 0.73 0.19
Si wafer 26.36 5.83 3.37 30 5.35 1.11 0.37
Fig. 3 a Absorbance, b transmittance spectra of the thin CdS films grown on various kinds of substrates
13
1312 A. Purohit et al.
region owing to the existence of its conventional absorption and grain size, change in mobility and free carrier concentra-
in this range. It is found higher in lower wavelength range tion, etc. [16, 65–67]. The band gap is proportional to strain
for all the substrates and later found to be decreased in the as well as lattice constant of films whereas it has an inverse
higher wavelength region after 500 nm for all films depos- relationship with the crystallite size [68].
ited on glass, ITO and FTO substrates while the films on The CdS films grown on Si substrate show a relatively
silicon wafer showed an anomalous behaviour which might lower band gap (1.63 eV) as compared to the bulk counter-
be due to light absorption by Si substrate owing to its rela- part (2.42 eV) and the films grown on other substrates as
tively narrower/lower band gap. The absorbance is observed well which may be attributed to the less defined absorption
to be almost constant within the 600–1100 nm wavelength edge which could lead to the formation of new level in the
range for the films grown on the ITO and FTO substrates. forbidden band gap [61]. The structural defects present in
As per Fig. 3(b), the transmittance (in the wavelength range the films may also cause shrinkage in the band gap of films
of 500–1100 nm) is found more than 60% for CdS films [69] and thus, the band gap is found lower. The calcu-
on ITO- and FTO-coated glass substrates while it is lower lated refractive index was found in the range of 2.51–2.88
for films on soda–lime glass and least for CdS films grown and varied with the nature of the underlying substrates
on Si wafer. A decrement in transmittance is observed near due to alteration in corresponding optical energy band
the absorption edge for ITO and FTO substrates which con- gap might be ascribed to the variation in packing den-
firmed the good crystallinity [8]. The larger transmittance is sity of the grown films and changes in polarizability of
found for the films grown on ITO and FTO substrates which ions in the films concerned [70]. The relative density is
reveal to the lower defect density on both the substrates [40], a dimensionless quantity that relates the refractive index
while the lower transmittance for glass and Si substrates is of deposited films with the standard refractive index of
also possible due to higher packing density of these films bulk material concerned. The relative density is strongly
[64]. dependent upon the crystallite size of films. In the present
The optical energy band gap (Eg) was evaluated from the study, the relative density is found in range of 0.99–1.07
optical absorption spectra using well-known Tauc’s relation for the films grown on different substrates owing to cor-
(Eq. (6)) by extrapolating the straight line towards the energy responding changes in the crystallite size and crystallin-
axis at zero absorption coefficient as shown in Fig. 4. The ity of CdS films. Lisco et al. [71] demonstrated almost
linear nature of the Tauc’s plots confirmed direct transition similar behaviour of optical parameters for CdS films as a
and optical energy band gap is obtained as 2.25 eV, 2.33 eV, function of the deposition power. The real and imaginary
2.50 eV, and 1.63 eV for films deposited on soda–lime glass, components of the complex dielectric constant of films are
ITO-, FTO-coated substrates, and silicon wafer, respectively. related to the regional field distribution within the sam-
The variation in optical energy band gap might be owing to ples. The real (εr) and imaginary (εi) dielectric constants
the alteration in the stoichiometry of CdS films or change in of CdS films are shown in Fig. 5 which are calculated
atomic/weight percentage of Cd and S elements at different using relations concerned [70]. It is evident from Fig. 5(a)
substrates, presence of impurities, variation in crystallinity that the real part exhibited almost similar behaviour for
Fig. 4 Tauc’s plots to determine the optical energy band gap of CdS films grown on a glass (inset ITO), b FTO (inset Si wafer) substrates
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Substrate Evolution to Microstructural and Optoelectrical Properties of Evaporated CdS Thin… 1313
Fig. 5 Variation in a real, b imaginary parts of dielectric constants with photon energy
the films grown on soda–lime glass, ITO and FTO sub- The variation in optical conductivity (σ0) is presented in
strates while it is increased with photon energy for the Fig. 6 (a) wherein σ0 increased with photon energy, which
films grown on Si wafer. The imaginary part (Fig. 5(b)) is may be due to electrons excitation by the incident photon
directly related to the density of state within the forbidden energy. It remained almost constant till hʋ ~ 2.00 eV and then
energy gap of the semiconductor material [72]. It is found increased because of absorption of the photon energy due to
to be decreased slightly for the films grown on ITO and excitation of the electrons [73, 74].
FTO substrates at lower energy regions and then increased, The current–voltage (I–V) characteristics of CdS films
while decreased continuously for Si wafer, which might deposited on FTO and Si wafer are presented in Fig. 6 (b)
be due to the regional field distribution inside the samples which reflected the linear dependency of current on voltage
and loss factor increase with photon energy [8]. in the entire voltage range, demonstrating the ohmic nature
Fig. 6 a Alteration in optical conductivity with photon energy, b I–V characteristics for CdS films grown on FTO-coated glass substrate and sili-
con wafer
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1314 A. Purohit et al.
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Substrate Evolution to Microstructural and Optoelectrical Properties of Evaporated CdS Thin… 1315
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Acknowledgements The authors are grateful to the CSIR-CEERI, [28] M. Shkir, M. Anis, S. Shafik, M.A. Manthrammel, M.A. Sayeed,
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Microelectronics Research Center, Iowa State University, Ames, [29] P. Kumar, N. Saxena, V. Gupta, J. Mater. Sci.: Mater. Electron.
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