Annealing temperature effect on structural, optical, morphological and electrical properties of CdS/Si(100) nanostructures

CdS nanostructures have grown on p-type silicon (Si) (100) substrates using sol-gel method. The crystalline quality, surface morphology, optical and electrical properties of the deposited CdS nanostructures have been characterized and analyzed using atomic force microscopy, scanning electron microscopy, X-ray diffraction, thermogravimetric analysis, differential thermal analysis, UV-vis spectroscopy and electrical characterization, respectively. The effect of annealing temperature in the range 200-600 A degrees C on the structural, morphological, optical and electrical properties has been elaborated. The XRD analysis shows that the crystalline quality can be improved by increasing the temperature to 400 A degrees C, but further increase to 600 A degrees C leads to degradation of crystalline quality. The bulk modulus is calculated and showed good agreement with experimental and theoretical results. The optical properties of absorption, reflection, energy band gap and extinction coefficient are obtained by UV-vis spectroscopy. The calculated refractive index and optical dielectric constant have shown good agreement with other results. The electrical and thermal properties are studied for antireflection coating applications.