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Materials Today: Proceedings 2 (2015) 5691 – 5694

International Conference on Solid State Physics 2013 (ICSSP’13)

Synthesis of ZnS nanoparticles by chemical bath deposition

M. Saeed Akhtara,*, Saira Riazb, Shahzad Naseemb
a
Department of Chemistry, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
b
Centre of Excellence in Solid State Physics, University of the Punjab, Lahore-54590, Pakistan

Abstract

ZnS nano particles are deposited on glass substrate by chemical bath deposition from acidic solutions. Effect of pH
on the surface morphology and structure of ZnS nano particles are investigated. XRD analysis confirms the growth
of ZnS with cubic (zinc blende) structure. SEM results show variation in grain size in the range of 65 to 300 nm for
nano particles obtained from solutions with increased pH values in the range of 3 to 4.5. UV-VIS studies show the
band gap of obtained nanoparticles in the range of 3.79 to 3.89 eV. The intended application for these nanoparticles
is optoelectronics and photovoltaic devices.

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Keywords: II-VI Semiconductors; Chemical Bath Deposition; Nanoparticles; Band Gap

* Corresponding author. E-mail address: saeed_khakhi@yahoo.com

2214-7853 © 2015 Published by Elsevier Ltd.

Selection and Peer-review under responsibility of the Committee Members of International Conference on Solid State Physics 2013 (ICSSP’13)
doi:10.1016/j.matpr.2015.11.111
5692 M. Saeed Akhtar et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2 (2015) 5691 – 5694

1. Introduction

As a counterpart of cadmium sulfide, another appropriate wider band gap buffer material is required and zinc
sulfide would be the best choice because it has wider band gap, non-toxicity and abundance in nature. Thin films of
ZnS have diverse range of applications, particularly in photovoltaic or optoelectronic devices [1]. Several techniques
have been employed for the preparation of high quality nano crystalline thin films of ZnS such as: sputtering,
thermal evaporation, metal organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD), molecular beam epitaxy (MBE), atomic
layer epitaxy (ALE) and chemical bath deposition (CBD) [2-5]. Among the above mentioned techniques, chemical
bath deposition is the simplest, cost effective and convenient method to prepare ZnS thin films since requirement of
high vacuum and complexity of process are major drawbacks of vapor-phase deposition methods. There are several
reports on the deposition of ZnS thin films via CBD method [6-9] but the crystallinity, morphology and phase
control is still under active debate. In the present work, ZnS nanoparticles were successfully synthesized via CBD
technique at acidic values of pH. These highly transparent ZnS nanoparticles are useful for their implementation in
optoelectronic devices. Band gap tuning can also be observed as an evidence of quantum confinement.

2. Experimental procedure

The ZnS thin films were grown on glass substrates from acidic bath containing solutions of zinc chloride, urea
and thioacetamide. Four solutions with pH values of 3, 3.5, 4 and 4.5 were prepared by adjusting pH with drop wise
addition of 0.2 M HCl. The synthesized samples were structurally characterized by Rigaku D-Max II-A
Diffractometer in the 2θ range of 20-80 degrees using CuKα radiations. Hitachi S-3400N Scanning Electron
Microscope was used to observe the nano-sized growth of ZnS on the surface of glass substrate.
Absorbance and transmittance spectrum was acquired using Shimadzu UV-VIS spectrophotometer.

3. Results and Discussion

XRD patterns of ZnS thin films at different pH values confirm their nano and polycrystalline nature as shown in
figure 1 (left). The observed diffraction peaks correspond to (111), (220) and (311) lattice planes of cubic phase and
are well matched with the reported data (ICSD # 01-080-0020). No diffraction peaks corresponding to any impurity
were detected, indicating the pure nature of ZnS thin films. Cell parameters have been calculated and are found to be
a=b=c = 5.35, which are close enough to the reported data in limitations to the expected experimental errors.

Figure 1 (right) shows the SEM micrographs of all four samples. SEM images indicate the uniform distribution
of particles throughout the substrate surface. Size of particles ranges from 65 nm to 212 nm and it was observed that
particles grow with increase in pH of the solution in acidic baths.

UV-VIS spectrophotometer was used to study the optical properties of ZnS thin films i.e. absorbance and
transmittance. The variation of (αhν)2 with photon energy hν is shown in figure 2. The energy gap, Eg, of the ZnS
thin films was evaluated by extrapolating the linear portion of the curve and intercept on energy-axis estimates the
band gap energy. The band gap values of 3.98 to 3.79 eV being found to be greater as reported in the literature for
cubic (zinc blende) ZnS (3.54 eV) [20]. This could be due to quantum confinement effect since the thin films are
composed of nanoparticles.
 M. Saeed Akhtar et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2 (2015) 5691 – 5694 5693

Fig. 1. XRD patterns and SEM images of CBD-deposited ZnS films on glass substrates
5694 M. Saeed Akhtar et al. / Materials Today: Proceedings 2 (2015) 5691 – 5694

Fig. 2: Optical band gap plots of CBD-deposited ZnS films on glass substrates

In summary, ZnS nanoparticles were synthesized via CBD. XRD revealed that these nanoparticles were cubic in
nature. SEM results were consistent with the XRD data and showed the compact nature of nanoparticles. UV-VIS
study showed high transparency of ZnS nanoparticles useful for their implementation in optoelectronic devices.

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