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Effect Of Oxidation Temperature And Oxidation Time On Thickness Of Copper (I) Oxide (Cu<sub>2</sub>O) Solar Cell


M Y Onimisi
N Hariharan
A O Musa

Abstract



Investigation has been made concerning the effect of oxidation temperature and time on the thickness of copper (I) oxides solar cells prepared by thermal oxidation method. The samples were oxidized at different oxidation temperatures and time. The different oxidation temperatures and lengths of time ware employed in order to find which oxidation temperature and time would result in the least thickness and stability of Cu2O on Cu which is a factor of the sample resistivity and output performance of a solar cell. Result shows that samples oxidized at the following temperatures and times gave the least thicknesses and stable oxides when compared with other samples at the different oxidation temperature and time: 9500C for 7minutes, 9700C for 6minutes, 9800C for 5minutes, 10000C for 4minutes and 10500C for 3 minutes. It was further observed that samples oxidized above or below these temperatures and times do not only exhibit poor performance when used in solar cell fabrication, but also stand the risk of breakage during chemical etching process as a result of the oxides being fragile.

Keywords: Annealing, etching, copper (I) oxide, thermal oxidation.

Nigerian Journal of Physics Vol. 19 (1) 2007: pp. 55-62

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eISSN: 1595-0611