Photoelectrochemical Characterization of Chemically Deposited Silver doped Indium Sulphide Film Electrodes
In recent years, the production of hydrogen from water with solar energy becomes one of new interesting research fields because of the requirements of clean energy. From the viewpoint of industrial applications, a thin film reactor is the convenient way to collect hydrogen in the water splitting without further separation process. In order to fabricate a thin film device with a superior efficiency, it is necessary to understand the properties on these new semiconductor films. In this study, the silver doped indium sulphide films electrodes were grown on indium-tin-oxide coated glass substrates by solution growth technique. The solutions containing silver nitrate, indium nitrate, triethanolamine, sodium citrate, ammonium nitrate, and thioacetamide in acidic solution were used for the deposition of silver doped indium sulfide film.The X-ray diffraction patterns of the samples demonstrate the presence of In2S3 phase in these films and a small shift in the peaks to a low-angle with the increase in Ag content in the film. It is observed that the ratios of Ag/In of the films increase with the increase in molar ratio of triethanolamode in the reaction solution using energy dispersion X-ray analysis. The band gaps of these samples determined from transmittance spectra are in the range of 2.1~2.23 eV. The maximum photocurrent density of samples with external potential kept at 2.0 V was found to be 4.5mA/cm2 in the aqueous solution containing S2-and SO32-ions and the illumination with white light intensity kept at 100 mW/cm2.