Effect of iron doping on structural and optical properties of TiO2thin film by sol–gel routed spin coating technique

Abstract

Thin films of iron (Fe)-doped titanium dioxide (Fe:TiO[Formula: see text] were prepared by sol–gel spin coating technique and further calcined at 450[Formula: see text]C. The structural and optical properties of Fe-doped TiO2thin films were investigated by X-ray diffraction (XRD), scanning electron microscopy (SEM), ultraviolet–visible spectroscopy (UV–vis) and atomic force microscopic (AFM) techniques. The XRD results confirm the nanostructured TiO2thin films having crystalline nature with anatase phase. The characterization results show that the calcined thin films having high crystallinity and the effect of iron substitution lead to decreased crystallinity. The SEM investigations of Fe-doped TiO2films also gave evidence that the films were continuous spherical shaped particles with a nanometric range of grain size and film was porous in nature. AFM analysis establishes that the uniformity of the TiO2thin film with average roughness values. The optical measurements show that the films having high transparency in the visible region and the optical band gap energy of Fe-doped TiO2film with iron (Fe) decrease with increase in iron content. These important requirements for the Fe:TiO2films are to be used as window layers in solar cells.