Effect of substrate temperature on spray deposited CdIn2Se4 thin films

Ternary chalcogenides with appropriate bandgap energy have been attracting a great deal of attention because of their potential applications in photovoltaics. CdIn2Se4 in the form of thin films is prepared at different substrate temperatures by a simple and economical spray pyrolysis technique. The films have been characterized by PEC, XRD, EDAX, and electrical measurement techniques. The photoelectrochemical characterization shows that both Isc and Voc are at their optimum values at the optimized substrate temperature of 280 °C. The annealing study reveals that the films annealed for 4 h show relatively maximum values of Isc and Voc. The XRD patterns show that the films are polycrystalline with crystallite size 24.8 nm for the film deposited at optimized preparative parameters. Compositional analysis reveals that the material formed is nearly stoichiometric at the optimized substrate temperature. The electrical resistivity measurement shows that the films are semiconducting at minimum resistivity. The thermoelectric power measurement reveals that the thermoelectric power is relatively maximum at substrate temperature 280 °C.