Current transport mechanism of antimony-doped TiO2 nanoparticles based on MOS device

•The fabrication and electrical characterizations of Sb-doped TiO2 based on MOS device.•The dominant conduction mechanism is the Fowler–Nordheim tunneling.•This structure is an excellent candidate for semiconductor device applications.

The present work reports the fabrication and electrical characterizations of Sb-doped TiO2/n-Si metal–oxide-semiconductor (MOS) device. To determine the effect of antimony dopant on the physical properties of TiO2, pure and Sb-doped thin films were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), field emission scanning electron microscope (FESEM) and ultraviolet–visible (UV–vis) spectroscopy. Current–voltage (I–V) and capacitance–voltage (C–V) measurements were done to determine electrical properties of the MOS structure. This structure showed a good rectifying behavior with a typical ideality factor of 2.09, which was considered high due to the current mechanism and large defect density at the interface. The possible conduction mechanism of the MOS structure was determined by analyzing the I–V characteristics. The obtained results show that this MOS structure is an excellent candidate for semiconductor device applications.