Abstract
The influence of sintering and annealing temperatures on the structural, surface morphology, and optical properties of Ag2Cu2O4 thin films which deposited on glass substrates by pulsed laser deposition method have been studied. Ag2Cu2O4 powders have polycrystalline structure, and the Ag2Cu2O4 phase was appear as low intensity peak at 35.57o which correspond the reflection from (110) plane. Scan electron microscopy images of Ag2Cu2O4 powder has been showed agglomerate of oxide particles with platelets shape. The structure of thin films has been improved with annealing temperature. Atomic Force micrographs of Ag2Cu2O4 films showed uniform, homogenous films and the shape of grains was almost spherical and larger grain size of 97.85 nm has obtained for film sintered at 600 °C. The optical band gap was increase from 1.6 eV to 1.65 eV when sintering temperature increased to 300 °C and decrease to 1.45 eV at 600 °C for the films deposited at room temperature. Heat treatment of films has been increased the energy band with increasing sintering temperature. Hall coefficient of Ag2Cu2O4 films have a positive sign which means the charge carrier is a p-type. The electrical conductivity decreases with increasing of the sintering temperature for as deposited and annealed films.
Highlights
Copper and silver belong to the same family, share common features, and readily form alloys in their metallic states
Munoz-Rojas et al prepared a new silver copper oxide, formulated as Ag2Cu2O4 by Electrochemical oxidation at room temperature of a slurry of Ag2Cu2O3, with one more atom of oxygen per unit formula, that can in turn revert to the original precursor [5]
The Silver-Copper-Oxide (Ag2Cu2O4) thin films were deposited by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) method on glass substrates at room temperature
Summary
Copper and silver belong to the same family, share common features, and readily form alloys in their metallic states. The silver-copper-oxygen (Ag-Cu-O) system consists of various ternary compounds Ag2Cu2O3, Ag2Cu2O4, and AgCuO2 [2] These compounds derived from the binaries of Ag2O, AgO, Cu2O, Cu4O3 and CuO [3]. The groups studying silver copper oxides as new promising materials for photovoltaic applications. Munoz-Rojas et al prepared a new silver copper oxide, formulated as Ag2Cu2O4 by Electrochemical oxidation at room temperature of a slurry of Ag2Cu2O3, with one more atom of oxygen per unit formula, that can in turn revert to the original precursor [5]. In particular electrochemical oxidation of Ag2Cu2O3 has allowed intercalation of oxygen but with a final change in structure to Ag2Cu2O4 with an extra oxygen atom per unit formula (this formula can be simplified to the empirical AgCuO2) [8]
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