Comparative Study of Structural and Opto-Electric Features of Environment Friendly AlSb Screen Printed and Brush Plated Films

Aluminium antimonide (AlSb) films are an applicable material in opto-electronic and photovoltaic devices. In the present work, AlSb films were successfully coated on glass substrate via economical screen-printing and brush plating methods. Structural, optical, and electrical attributes of these films were characterized by XRD, HRSEM, EDAX, UV–Vis spectrophotometery and a two-probe technique. XRD analysis revealed that obtained AlSb films by both methods have (111) plane as favored orientation with cubic phase structure. EDAX analysis revealed the atomic proportion of Al with Sb was ~1 : 1, which is stoichiometric proportion. HRSEM analysis showed that the surface of AlSb films is layered with sphere-shaped and rough crystals. Numerous pores and large size crystals were observed in the brush plated film as compared with AlSb screen printed film. Via UV–Vis analysis AlSb was established as an indirect optical gap material; with optical band gap value of both type films was observed in close agreement to its theoretical value (1.62 eV). Electrical resistivity measurements via a two probe equipment, semiconducting nature for both types of films were found. Activation energy was also calculated by employing Arrhenius plot.