Photochemical deposition of ZnSe polycrystalline thin films and their characterization

Abstract ZnSe thin films were deposited for the first time by an alternative, recently established novel technique, namely ‘photochemical deposition’, from an aqueous solution. The various deposition parameters and post-deposition treatment conditions were optimized for the growth of stoichiometric, uniform ZnSe thin films on indium-tin-oxide coated glass substrate. The as-deposited films were annealed at 300 and 400 °C and both the as-grown and annealed films were characterized by various techniques such as X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, Auger electron spectroscopy (AES) etc. The XRD study confirmed the formation of cubic ZnSe upon annealing at 300 °C. The optical phonon peak corresponding to crystalline ZnSe was clearly observed in the Raman spectrum, which additionally confirmed the deposition of ZnSe compound semiconductor. AES analysis indicated that, the prepared ZnSe films exhibit stoichiometric composition.