Investigation of Au9+ swift heavy ion irradiation on CdS/CuInSe2 thin films

• Nanostructured CdS/CuInSe2 can be grown by chemical ion exchange method.
• Physicochemical and optoelectronic properties can be modified by 120 MeV Au9+ SHI Irradiation.
• Solar energy conversion efficiency improved from 0.26 to 1.59% in CdS/CuInSe2 upon irradiation.

In the present manuscript we report about the preparation of CdS/CuInSe2 heterojunction thin films by chemical ion exchange method and investigation of 120 MeV Au9+ swift heavy ions (SHI) irradiation effect on its physicochemical as well as optoelectronic properties. These pristine (as grown) samples are irradiated with 120 MeV Au9+ SHI of 5×1011 and 5×1012 ions/cm2 fluencies and later on characterized for structural, compositional, morphological, optical and I–V characteristics. X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern obtained from pristine and irradiated films shows considerable modifications in peak intensity as well as rising of some new peaks, corresponding to In2Se3, Cu3Se2 and CuIn2Se3 materials. Transmission electron microscope (TEM) images show decrease in grain size upon increase in irradiation ion fluencies, which is also supported from the observation of random and uneven distribution of nano-grains as confirmed through scanning electron microscope (SEM) images. Presence of Cd, Cu, In, S and Se in energy dispersive X-ray spectrum analysis (EDAX) confirms the expected and observed elemental composition in thin films, the absorbance peaks are related to band to band transitions and spin orbit splitting while energy band gap is observed to increase from 1.36 for pristine to 1.53 eV for SHI irradiated thin films and I–V characteristics under illumination to 100 mW/cm2 light source shows enhancement in conversion efficiency from 0.26 to 1.59% upon irradiation.