Bernabe Mari1*, Miguel Mollar1, Amany El Nahrawy2, Suzan Saber1,2,3, Nagwa Khattab2, Ali Eid2, Mohamed Abo-Aly3 and Feriel Bouhjar1,4,5
This paper reports on the growth of quaternary Cu2ZnSnS4 (CZTS) thin films by a single step electrochemical deposition followed by annealing at low temperature. The influence of different annealing atmospheres at constant annealing times (t=45 min) and fixed preparation controlling parameters; i.e., starting materials (precursor metal salts) solution concentration, time of deposition and electrodeposition potential. Structural, compositional, morphological and optical properties as well as photoelectrochemical properties were studied. The films sulfurized during 2 hours, showed a prominent kesterite phase with a nearly stoichiometric composition. Samples were characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), EDS and UV-VIS-NIR spectrometry. X-ray diffraction and confirmed the formation of pure kesterite CZTS films. SEM shows that films are compact with dense morphology and homogeneous distribution. EDS analyzed the elemental constituents of the quaternary Cu2ZnSnS4 with an apparent Cu deficiency and S rich for the sulfurized samples. From optical study, the energy gap was indexed for the sulfurized samples. Eg=1.52 eV. Under illumination sulfurized CZTS films exhibits negative photocurrent and positive photovoltage values confirming the p-type character of the films.
