Temperature Dependent Carrier Transport in Hydrogenated Amorphous Semiconductors for Thin Film Memristive Applications

This paper demonstrates the transport of electron and hole carriers in two distinct hydrogenated amorphous semiconductor materials at different temperatures. Compared to crystalline materials, the amorphous semiconductors differ structurally, optically and electrically, hence the nature of carrier transport through such amorphous materials differ. Materials like hydrogenated amorphous silicon and amorphous IGZO have been used for the study of temperature dependent carrier transport in this paper. Simulation results have been presented to show the variation of free electron and hole concentration, trapped electron and hole concentration with energy at 300K for both the materials. The change in mobility with a change in the Fermi level has been plotted for different temperatures. The effect of temperature on Brownian motion mobility of electrons and holes in hydrogenated amorphous silicon and amorphous IGZO has been demonstrated towards the end of this paper.

Thick Si-doped DLC coatings with high load bearing capacity on cold working tool steels by PECVD

For improving the wear resistance, thick silicon doped hydrogenated amorphous carbon (a-SiC:H) coatings were deposited on cold working tool steels by Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition (PECVD) technology. The increase of the acetylene (C2H2) flow rate distinctly tuned the microstructure of a-SiC:H coatings, including an increase in the coating thickness (>15 μm), a decrease in the silicon content, a greater sp2/sp3 ratio and higher degree of graphitization. The highest hardness of 19.61 GPa and the greatest critical load of 50.7 N were obtained. The coating showed low wear rates against different friction pairs and presented excellent abrasive wear resistance at high applied load and the wear rates decreased with increasing loads, which exhibited an outstanding application prospect in cold working tool steels.

Flat telescope based on an all-dielectric metasurface doublet enabling polarization-controllable enhanced beam steering

A flat telescope (FTS), which incorporates an all-dielectric metasurface doublet (MD) based on hydrogenated amorphous silicon nanoposts, is proposed and demonstrated to achieve flexibly magnified angular beam steering that is sensitive to both light polarization and deflection direction. Specifically, for transverse-electric-polarized incident beams, the MD exhibits deflection magnification factors of +5 and +2, while for transverse magnetic polarization, the beam is steered in reverse to yield magnification factors of −5 and −2 in the horizontal and vertical directions, respectively. The proposed MD comprises cascaded metalenses, which can invoke polarization-selective transmission phases. The MD which emulates a set of convex and concave lenses renders positively increased beam deflection, whereas the case corresponding to a pair of convex lenses facilitates negatively amplified beam deflection. The essential phase profiles required for embodying the MD are efficiently extracted from its geometric lens counterpart. Furthermore, the implemented FTS, operating in the vicinity of a 1550 nm wavelength, can successfully enable enhanced beam steering by facilitating polarization-sensitive bidirectional deflection amplifications. The proposed FTS can be applied in the development of a miniaturized light detection and ranging system, where the beam scanning range can be effectively expanded in two dimensions.

Performance Enhancement of an a-Si:H/μc-Si:H Heterojunction p-i-n Solar Cell by Tuning the Device Parameters

In this work, the solar cell design parameters like- layer thickness, bandgap, donor and acceptor concentrations are varied to find optimum structure of a hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) and hydrogenated microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) heterojunction p-i-n solar cell. A thin a-Si:H p-layer of 1 to 5 nm followed by a thick a-Si:H i-layer of thickness 1400 to 1600 nm and then thin n-layer of thickness 1 to 5 nm with acceptor concentration of 102 cm−3 and donor concentration of 1020 cm−3 and the bandgaps of p-, i-, and n- layers with higher bandgaps closer to 2.2 eV for a-Si:H p-layer, 1.85 eV for a-Si:H i-layer, and 1.2 eV for μc-Si:H n-layer have showed better performances. The optimum cell has a JSC of 18.93 mA/cm2, VOC of 1095 mV, Fill factor of 0.7124, and efficiency of 14.77%. The overall external quantum efficiency of the numerically designed cell also remained very high from 85-95 % for wavelengths of 300-650 nm range. This indicates that the device will perform its best under both high and low frequency i.e. ultra-violet, near visible and visible light wavelengths. Dhaka Univ. J. Sci. 69(2): 88-95, 2021 (July)

Sputtered Non-Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon as Alternative Absorber for Silicon Photovoltaic Technology

Non-hydrogenated amorphous-silicon films were deposited on glass substrates by Radio Frequency magnetron sputtering with the aim of being used as precursor of a low-cost absorber to replace the conventional silicon absorber in solar cells. Two Serie of samples were deposited varying the substrate temperature and the working gas pressure, ranged from 0.7 to 4.5 Pa. The first Serie was deposited at room temperature, and the second one, at 325 °C. Relatively high deposition rates above 10 Å/s were reached by varying both deposition temperature and working Argon gas pressure to ensure high manufacturing rates. After deposition, the precursor films were treated with a continuous-wave diode laser to achieve a crystallized material considered as the alternative light absorber. Firstly, the structural and optical properties of non-hydrogenated amorphous silicon precursor films were investigated by Raman spectroscopy, atomic force microscopy, X-ray diffraction, reflectance, and transmittance, respectively. Structural changes were observed in the as-deposited films at room temperature, suggesting an orderly structure within an amorphous silicon matrix; meanwhile, the films deposited at higher temperature pointed out an amorphous structure. Lastly, the effect of the precursor material’s deposition conditions, and the laser parameters used in the crystallization process on the quality and properties of the subsequent crystallized material was evaluated. The results showed a strong influence of deposition conditions used in the amorphous silicon precursor.

Hydrogenated Amorphous TiO2−x and Its High Visible Light Photoactivity

Hydrogenated crystalline TiO2 with oxygen vacancy (OV) defect has been broadly investigated in recent years. Different from crystalline TiO2, hydrogenated amorphous TiO2−x for advanced photocatalytic applications is scarcely reported. In this work, we prepared hydrogenated amorphous TiO2−x (HA-TiO2−x) using a unique liquid plasma hydrogenation strategy, and demonstrated its highly visible-light photoactivity. Density functional theory combined with comprehensive analyses was to gain fundamental understanding of the correlation among the OV concentration, electronic band structure, photon capturing, reactive oxygen species (ROS) generation, and photocatalytic activity. One important finding was that the narrower the bandgap HA-TiO2−x possessed, the higher photocatalytic efficiency it exhibited. Given the narrow bandgap and extraordinary visible-light absorption, HA-TiO2−x showed excellent visible-light photodegradation in rhodamine B (98.7%), methylene blue (99.85%), and theophylline (99.87) within two hours, as well as long-term stability. The total organic carbon (TOC) removal rates of rhodamine B, methylene blue, and theophylline were measured to 55%, 61.8%, and 50.7%, respectively, which indicated that HA-TiO2−x exhibited high wastewater purification performance. This study provided a direct and effective hydrogenation method to produce reduced amorphous TiO2−x which has great potential in practical environmental remediation.

Fabrication of a Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon Detector in 3-D Geometry and Preliminary Test on Planar Prototypes

Hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) can be produced by plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) of SiH4 (silane) mixed with hydrogen. The resulting material shows outstanding radiation hardness properties and can be deposited on a wide variety of substrates. Devices employing a-Si:H technologies have been used to detect many different kinds of radiation, namely, minimum ionizing particles (MIPs), X-rays, neutrons, and ions, as well as low-energy protons and alphas. However, the detection of MIPs using planar a-Si:H diodes has proven difficult due to their unsatisfactory S/N ratio arising from a combination of high leakage current, high capacitance, and limited charge collection efficiency (50% at best for a 30 µm planar diode). To overcome these limitations, the 3D-SiAm collaboration proposes employing a 3D detector geometry. The use of vertical electrodes allows for a small collection distance to be maintained while preserving a large detector thickness for charge generation. The depletion voltage in this configuration can be kept below 400 V with a consequent reduction in the leakage current. In this paper, following a detailed description of the fabrication process, the results of the tests performed on the planar p-i-n structures made with ion implantation of the dopants and with carrier selective contacts are illustrated.