Performance assessment of oxygenated CdS films-based photodetector

Abstract

dS films were grown by thermal evaporation on glass substrates. After growth process, samples were oxygenated at 400 °C at various gas pressures for 5 mins employing rapid thermal process. The produced CdS films were used as photodetectors in blue light. X-ray diffraction results revealed that as-deposited CdS films had a wurtzite crystal structure with a satrong preferred orientation along (002) plane. The intensity of (002) peak increased by rising oxygen gas pressure to 2 atm and then decreased with further increase of oxygen gas pressure to 4 atm. Scanning electron microscopy analysis indicated that even though as-deposited CdS thin films included some aligned rod-like grains on an underlaying layer, oxygenation at various gas pressures changed the surface morphology of CdS films. CdS films oxygenated at a gas pressure of 2 atm exhibited the best transmittance value of 80% in the range of 600–1000 nm. It was calculated that band gap increased from 2.42 eV to 2.45 eV as CdS films were oxygenated at a gas pressure of 2 atm. Photoluminescence spectrum of as-deposited CdS films indicated two fundamental peaks located at 530 nm and an interval of 550–700 nm, corresponding to green and deep level emissions, respectively. Consequently, it was attained that CdS films oxygenated at a pressure of 2 atm had the optimized structural, morphological and optical results and therefore, this sample was further employed for photodetecting applications. From photocurrent-time curves, the best photodetecting performance was reached for CdS films-based device oxygenated at a gas pressure of 2 atm including rise time and fall time values of 22 ms and 25 ms, respectively. In addition, the maximum responsivity, detectivity and external quantum efficiency were found to be 23.7 mA/W, 4.75 × 108 Jones and 6.6 for the same photodetector, respectively.