Optical and photoelectrochemical studies of tungsten sulphoselenide (WSSe) thin films for solar panels

Foo, Yeong Horng (2016) Optical and photoelectrochemical studies of tungsten sulphoselenide (WSSe) thin films for solar panels. Project Report. Universiti Teknikal Malaysia Melaka, Melaka, Malaysia. (Submitted)

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Abstract

Transition metal dichalcogenide thin films has greatly interest in the investigation as solar panel material. Tungsten sulphoselenide WSSe thin films were investigated in this research and it were successfully electrodeposited on indium-tin-oxide (ITO)-coated glass substrates. The deposition time for the thin films were set at 10 to 30 minutes with an interval of 5 minutes. Cyclic voltammetry technique was used to determine the optimum potential for deposition of WSSe thin films. Thickness of thin films were measured by using weight gain method. The thin films were characterized for their structural and surface morphological characteristics by XRD and SEM. Their optical and semiconducting parameters were also analyzed in order to determine the suitability of the thin films for photoelectrochemical (PEC) / solar cell applications. WSSe thin films were well adherent to the substrates with optimum potential of -0.46V and grew up to thickness of 1.44 μm. Structural analysis via X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis reveals that the films are polycrystalline with increasing intensity of XRD peaks in thicker films. The surface morphology of the films determined by scanning electron microscope (SEM) showed the growth of the films to be uniform and well covered for thicker films. The optical bandgap energy of the films measured as 2.14 eV for PEC / solar cell materials which decreased as the deposition time of the film increased. Bandgap energy of 1.5 eV was obtained for WSSe thin films deposited at 30 minutes. Results on the semiconducting parameters analysis of the films showed that the nature of the Mott-Schottky plots indicated that the films obtained was of p-type material. The decreasing values for the depletion width of the films from 8.55 to 4.34 Å in WSSe thin films are in good agreement with the decreasing energy gap values retrieved from optical studies. All values come in the range of many other transition metal chalcogenide and this has proven that WSSe thin films is capable as a solar / PEC cell material.

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