• Current Applied Physics
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• v.18 no.11
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• pp.1458-1464
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• 2018

An improved method for the preparation of g-$C_3N_4$ is described. Currently, heating (> $400^{\circ}C$) of urea is the common method used for preparing the g-$C_3N_4$. We have found that sonication of melamine in $HNO_3$ solution, followed by washing with anhydrous ethanol, not only reduce the crystallite size of g-$C_3N_4$ but also facilitate intriguing electronic structure and photoluminescence (PL) properties. Moreover, loading of metal (Pt and Ag) nanoparticles, by applying the borohydride reduction method, has resulted in multicolor-emission from g-$C_3N_4$. With the help of PL spectra and local electronic structure study, at C K-edge, N K-edge, Pt L-edge and Ag K-edge by X-ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS), a precise mechanism of tunable luminescence is established. The PL mechanism ascribes the amendments in the transitions, via defect and/or metal states assimilation, between the ${\pi}^*$ states of tris-triazine ring of g-$C_3N_4$ and lone pair states of nitride. It is evidenced that interaction between the C/N 2p and metal 4d/5d orbitals of Ag/Pt has manifested a net detraction in the ${\delta}^*{\rightarrow}LP$ transitions and enhancement in the ${\pi}^*{\rightarrow}LP$ and ${\pi}^*{\rightarrow}{\pi}$ transitions, leading to broad PL spectra from g-$C_3N_4$ organic semiconductor compound.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.36 no.6
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• pp.588-593
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• 2023

The advantage of OTFT technology is that large-area circuits can be manufactured on flexible substrates using a low-cost solution process such as inkjet printing. Compared to silicon-based inorganic semiconductor processes, the process temperature is lower and the process time is shorter, so it can be widely applied to fields that do not require high electron mobility. Materials that have utility as electrode materials include carbon that can be solution-processed, transparent carbon thin films, and metallic nanoparticles, etc. are being studied. Recently, a technology has been developed to facilitate charge injection by coating the surface of the Al electrode with solution-processable titanium oxide (TiOx), which can greatly improve the performance of OTFT. In order to commercialize OTFT technology, an appropriate method is to use a complementary circuit with excellent reliability and stability. For this, insulators and channel semiconductors using organic materials must have stability in the air. In this study, carbon-doped Mo (MoC) thin films were fabricated with different graphite target power densities via unbalanced magnetron sputtering (UBM). The influence of graphite target power density on the structural, surface area, physical, and electrical properties of MoC films was investigated. MoC thin films deposited by the unbalanced magnetron sputtering method exhibited a smooth and uniform surface. However, as the graphite target power density increased, the rms surface roughness of the MoC film increased, and the hardness and elastic modulus of the MoC thin film increased. Additionally, as the graphite target power density increased, the resistivity value of the MoC film increased. In the performance of an organic thin film transistor using a MoC gate electrode, the carrier mobility, threshold voltage, and drain current on/off ratio (I_on/I_off) showed 0.15 cm²/V·s, -5.6 V, and 7.5×10⁴, respectively.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.417-417
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• 2016

Global environmental deterioration has become more serious year by year and thus scientific interests in the renewable energy as environmental technology and replacement of fossil fuels have grown exponentially. Photoelectrochemical (PEC) cell consisting of semiconductor photoelectrodes that can harvest light and use this energy directly to split water, also known as photoelectrolysis or solar water splitting, is a promising renewable energy technology to produce hydrogen for uses in the future hydrogen economy. A major advantage of PEC systems is that they involve relatively simple processes steps as compared to many other H2 production systems. Until now, a number of materials including TiO2, WO3, Fe2O3, and BiVO4 were exploited as the photoelectrode. However, the PEC performance of these single absorber materials is limited due to their large charge recombinations in bulk, interface and surface, leading low charge separation/transport efficiencies. Recently, coupling of two materials, e.g., BiVO4/WO3, Fe2O3/WO3 and CuWO4/WO3, to form a type II heterojunction has been demonstrated to be a viable means to improve the PEC performance by enhancing the charge separation and transport efficiencies. In this study, we have prepared a triple-layer heterojunction BiVO4/WO3/SnO2 photoelectrode that shows a comparable PEC performance with previously reported best-performing nanostructured BiVO4/WO3 heterojunction photoelectrode via a facile solution method. Interestingly, we found that the incorporation of SnO2 nanoparticles layer in between WO3 and FTO largely promotes electron transport and thus minimizes interfacial recombination. The impact of the SnO2 interfacial layer was investigated in detail by TEM, hall measurement and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) techniques. In addition, our planar-structured triple-layer photoelectrode shows a relatively high transmittance due to its low thickness (~300 nm), which benefits to couple with a solar cell to form a tandem PEC device. The overall PEC performance, especially the photocurrent onset potential (Vonset), were further improved by a reactive-ion etching (RIE) surface etching and electrocatalyst (CoOx) deposition.