Nanocrystalline CdS/ZnO thin films: fabrication and application to solar cells

In this paper we reported the preparation and characterization of the nanostrutured CdS/ZnO nanoarray thin film, based on the free-standing ZnO nanorod-array. The method was simple and low-cost. The ZnO nanorod-arrays were synthesized on F-doped tin oxide glass (TCO) substrate by hydrothermal method, then coated with CdS nanoparticles closely via chemical bath deposition method. The resulting thin films showed better photoelectrochemical performances than those of CdS/ZnO nanoparticles thin films. Under the illumination of AM 1.5 simulated sunlight (30 mW/cm2), the photocurrent of the samples achieved to 0.72 mA/cm2.