Abstract
Silver(I) ethylxanthate [AgS2COEt] (1) and antimony(III) ethylxanthate [Sb(S2COEt)3] (2) have been synthesised, characterised and used as precursors for the preparation of AgSbS2 powders and thin films using a solvent-free melt method and spin coating technique, respectively. The as-synthesized AgSbS2 powders were characterized by powder X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) spectroscopy. The crystalline AgSbS2 powder was investigated using XRD, which shows that AgSbS2 has cuboargyrite as the dominant phase, which was also confirmed by Raman spectroscopy. SEM was also used to study the morphology of the resulting material which is potentially nanostructured. EDX spectra gives a clear indication of the presence of silver (Ag), antimony (Sb) and sulfur (S) in material, suggesting that decomposition is clean and produces high quality AgSbS2 crystalline powder, which is consistent with the XRD and Raman data. Electronic properties of AgSbS2 thin films deposited by spin coating show a p-type conductivity with measured carrier mobility of 81 cm2 V−1 s−1 and carrier concentration of 1.9 × 1015 cm−3. The findings of this study reveal a new bottom-up route to these compounds, which have potential application as absorber layers in solar cells.
Highlights
Silver(I) ethylxanthate [AgS2COEt] (1) and antimony(III) ethylxanthate [Sb(S2COEt)3] (2) have been synthesised, characterised and used as precursors for the preparation of AgSbS2 powders and thin films using a solvent-free melt method and spin coating technique, respectively
We describe a metal xanthate precursor route to produce ternary silver antimony sulfide (AgSbS2) as a single well-defined phase via thermal decomposition of metal xanthate precursors in stoichiometric ratios. AgSbS2 is rarely found in nature but possesses potentially excellent properties for solar cell applications[51,52]
Infrared (IR) and nuclear magnetic resonsnce (NMR) spectroscopies were used to assess the purity of complexes (1) and (2) and the spectra recorded are shown in the ESI (Fig. S1.1 and S1.2)
Summary
Silver(I) ethylxanthate [AgS2COEt] (1) and antimony(III) ethylxanthate [Sb(S2COEt)3] (2) have been synthesised, characterised and used as precursors for the preparation of AgSbS2 powders and thin films using a solvent-free melt method and spin coating technique, respectively. Focusing on I–III–VI2-type and I–III2–VI4-types, which include elements from group I (Cu, Ag), group III (Ga and In) and group VI (S and Se) results in chalcopyrite-type materials These are desirable due to their reduced toxicity, and high absorption coefficients extending across the visible to near-infrared wavelengths 17. Due to the pre-formed bonds between metal and chalcogenide atoms, metal xanthates can act as efficient precursors for the formation of solid state metal sulfides This has led to the extensive application of, for instance, xanthate complexes for the production of thin films[43,44]. Advantages conferred by this sort of synthetic route include the ability to carry out low temperature decomposition, the ease of synthesis and stability of the resulting compound in air, along with the fact that by-products for these materials are generally gaseous. O’Brien & Lewis have reported a number of such syntheses for a range of main group and transition metal sulfides[45,46,47,48,49,50]
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