Baking impact on photoelectrochemical cells performance of electrodeposited CdSe films

Cadmium selenide (CdSe) nanocrystalline thin films in the form of upright nanocones, perpendicular to substrate surface, are grown electrochemically onto a conducting and transparent indium–tin-oxide substrate at room temperature and impact of baking under oxygen flow on their structure, morphology, optical absorbance and dark-light photoelectrochemical cell performance is explored. Crystallinity improvement followed by enhancement in the surface roughness 11–19 nm and reduction in water contact angle from 60° to 22° (±0.2)° due to baking impact showed increase in crystallite size from 25 to 100 Å. Increase in current density from 0.07 to 5.61 mA/cm2 after baking under oxygen flow has promoted the conversion efficiency to 0.5% from 0.007%.

► Systematic study of the effect of air baking temperature on the structural and morphological properties of cadmium selenide (CdSe) films is presented.
► CdSe films are prepared using electrodeposition.
► It is observed that crystallinity of CdSe can be improved after air baking.
► CdSe films baked at different temperatures show variation in surface wettability and electrochemical characteristics.