Influence of dopant concentration on the electronic band gap energy of Yb-ZrSe2 thin films for photovoltaic application via electrochemical deposition technique

Abstract

Abstract This research focus on the Influence of Dopant Concentration on Polycrystalline Ytterbium-doped ZrSe (Yb-ZrSe) material for possible photovoltaic application using the electrochemical deposition method. The cationic precursor was an aqueous solution of 0.01 mol ZrOCl2.8H2O while the anionic precursor was 0.15 mol selenium was prepared by dissolving with 5 ml of Hydrochloric acid (HCl), and then 0.05 mol Yb (NO3)3.5H2O was used as the dopant. The films were characterized using UV-1800 Visible Spectrophotometer, Bruker D8 Advance x-ray diffractometer with Cu Kα line (λ = 1.54056 Å) in 2θ range from 10°–90°and Scanning Electron Microscopy. X-ray diffraction (XRD) of the deposited films on FTO substrate studies reveals that films are polycrystalline by exhibiting diffraction peaks at (111), (200), (200) and (210) corresponds to the following angle (27.00°), (38.01°), (46.02°), (66.02°). (SEM) revealed that the grain size was uniformly distributed on the surface of the substrate. The optical band gap energy 2.29 − 1.57 eV was obtained.