ANNEALING PROCESS EFFECT ON STRUCTURAL AND OPTICAL CHARACTERISTICS OF Cu₂ONPs:SnS THIN FILM AND EFFICIENCY OF Cu₂ONPs:SnS/Si SOLAR CELL

Technology in magnetics, photonics and optoelectronics continues to improve in large part due to the use of thin film materials. Cuprous oxide:tin sulfide (Cu 2 O:SnS) thin films were fabricated onto a glass substrate by the technique of thermal rate of around 0.3[Formula: see text]nm/s and under a vacuum of about 10[Formula: see text] mbar, after that the coated Cu 2 O:SnS thin films have been annealed at [Formula: see text]C. Investigations using X-ray diffraction (XRD) reveal that the as-deposited Cu 2 O:SnS films are strongly orientated to the (020) direction and that they correspond to the orthorhombic phase and after being annealed at temperatures of up to [Formula: see text]C, the films undergo a transformation that results in a polycrystalline structure with reduction in average crystal size from 16[Formula: see text]nm to 14[Formula: see text]nm. Using a UV-Visible spectrophotometer, the optical parameters, such as transmittance and energy band gap, of films subjected to thermal annealing were investigated. The variation in band gap values of Cu 2 O:SnS thin film samples was determined to be between 3.66 and 3.86[Formula: see text]eV for the grown and annealed samples, while Urbach energy decreased from 1.637[Formula: see text]eV to 1.340[Formula: see text]eV after the annealing process with shifting the absorption edge toward higher energy. The morphology of Cu 2 O:SnS thin films as-synthesized and annealed was investigated. The current–voltage (I–V) curve was analyzed to evaluate the electrical characteristics of annealed Cu 2 O:SnS/Si solar cells such as fill factor (FF), open circuit voltage,(V OC ), short circuit current ([Formula: see text]) and the efficiency ([Formula: see text]) which were found to be 0.595, 500[Formula: see text]mV, 25[Formula: see text]mA and 7.44%, respectively.