Preparation of antimony selenide thin films by electrochemical deposition and application in optoelectronic devices

Antimony selenide (Sb 2 Se 3 ) has become a potential semiconductor material for a wide range of optoelectronic applications because of its unique one-dimensional crystal structure and corresponding excellent anisotropic optical and electronic properties. Herein, uniform and flat Sb 2 Se 3 thin films with [hk1]-optimized growth orientation are prepared by adjusting the deposition potentials and selenization temperatures using a facile electrochemical deposition method. Then these films are applied in heterojunction-type photodetectors with the structure of Mo/Sb 2 Se 3 /CdS/ZnO/ITO/Ag. The best performances are obtained for devices with a deposition potential of −0.55 V and a selenization temperature of 300 °C. At 0 bias, the detector yielded a responsivity of 25.4 mA/W and a detectivity of 1.06 × 10 11 Jones at 635 nm visible light with a light intensity of 5 mW. The results show that high-quality Sb 2 Se 3 thin films can be prepared by electrochemical deposition under proper preparation conditions, which lays the foundation for the application of the electrochemical deposition method in the field of optoelectronic devices .