Associate Professor  S.  Thanikaikarasan
Saveetha University,  India

Title: Low Cost Environmentaly Friendly Electrodeposition of Metal Chalcogenides for Energy Conversion Devices

Abstract:

Metal chlcogenides attracted substantial interest in numerous fields due to its combination of physical, chemical, optical, electrical and electronic properties. Copper sulfide, Copper selenide, Copper telluride have considerable interest because of its well defined structure, composition and electronic properties. The technique of electrodeposition have been employed to prepare Cu₂S, Cu¬₂Se, Cu₂Te thin film phtoelectrodes, since it is simple, low cost, low temperature, as well as the composition of deposited thin films controlled by the concentration of electrolytic bath and solution pH values. Also, the deposited films have well defined crystallinity without the processof annealing thereafter the crystallinity improvement depends upon the annealing temperature. The objective of the research work is the growth of Cu₂S, Cu₂Se, Cu₂Te phtoelectrodes Tin Oxide substrate by the technique of potentiostatic electrodeposition. XRD pattern reported that the deposited films found to polycrystalline nature with cubic and hexagonal structure at low temperature in between 50 and 80°C. Film composition with surface morphology represented that the deposited films have smooth surface with well defined stoichiometry. Optical properties reported that the deposited films found to be exhibit indirect transition with band gap value in between 2.3 and 2.8 eV. Also the determination of parameters band gap, refractive index, extinction coefficient, real, imaginary dielectric constant, electrical and optical conductivity to correlate the optical, electrical and electronic properties. Photoelectrochemical cells constructed using the fabricated Cu₂S, Cu₂Se, Cu₂Te photoelectrodes and the cell parameters open circuit voltage, short circuit constant, fill factor and efficiency cell were determined.

Biography:

Dr.Sethuramachandran Thanikaikarasan is presently working as a Associate Professor in the Department of Physics, Saveetha School of Engineering, Saveetha University (Deemed), Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India. He obtained his M.Sc and Ph.D Degree in Physics (Specialistation : Insturmentation; Materials Sciences;Thin films, Electrodeposition) in India 2004 and 2010, respectively.  He has vast research experience in the field of Thin films, Electrodeposition, optical and magnetic materials, photoelectrochemistry.He has awarded as Senior Research Fellow (CSIR-SRF), HRDG, New Delhi, India on 2008 upto 2010.He holds over 150 publications in the international Journals with Science Citation Index, Web of Science; Scopus, Google Scholar index (citations: 1627; Scopus: 1228 h index: 22; i10 index: 46). He has successfully completed research project funded amount (4,80,000)by Council of Science and Industrial Research (CSIR), HRDG, New Delhi, India and two major projects Rupees Fifty Lakhs (INR.50,00,000) funded by Board of Research in Nuclear Sciences, Department of Atomic Energy (BRNS-DAE),Baba Atomic Research Centre (BARC), Mumbai, India. He has is in the rank of (Scientists:1.446.058;Countries:219;Universities:23.032) in “AD Scientific Index” from 2021 upto 2024