Undoped and Manganese²⁺-doped polycrystalline Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te sensitizer for liquid-junction solar cell devices

• Main Authors: Singsa-ngah,M., Hongsith,K., Choopun,S., Tubtimtae,A.
• Format: Article
• Published: Academic Press Inc. 2015
• Subjects: Surfaces, Coatings and Films; Colloid and Surface Chemistry; Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials; Biomaterials
• Online Access: http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?partnerID=HzOxMe3b&scp=84927724980&origin=inward; http://cmuir.cmu.ac.th/handle/6653943832/38924
• Institution: Chiang Mai University

© 2015 Elsevier Inc. Ternary Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te semiconductor nanoparticles have been demonstrated to be sensitizers for solar cell devices. The chemical bath deposition (CBD) process was used to synthesize Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te nanoparticles, which were deposited onto a mesoporous TiO<inf>2</inf> photoelectrode. Individual nanoparticles were estimated to have an average diameter range of ~10nm. The atomic percentages of chemical elements for Mn²⁺-doped Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te show that the structure could be Mn²⁺-doped CdInTe incorporated with CdIn<inf>2</inf>Te<inf>4</inf> structure. The resulted X-ray diffraction and diffraction ring patterns of Mn²⁺-doped Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te nanoparticles indicated the structure to be tetragonal. The optical band gaps were also decreased to 0.9eV after Mn²⁺ doping, compared with E<inf>g</inf>=1.47eV for undoped Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te(7). The best efficiency of 0.51% under 100 mW/cm² (AM 1.5G) was obtained after Mn²⁺ doping with a short-circuit current density (J<inf>sc</inf>) of 1.71mA/cm², an open-circuit voltage (V<inf>oc</inf>) of 0.739V and a fill factor (FF) of 40.2%. This work demonstrated the feasibility of using Cd<inf>1-</inf><inf>x</inf>In<inf>x</inf>Te with Mn²⁺ doping as a broadband solar absorber for TiO<inf>2</inf> photoelectrodes.