Measurement of charge carrier mobilities in thin films on metal substrates by reflection time resolved terahertz...

We show that charge carrier mobilities can be measured by reflection time resolved THz spectroscopy (R-TRTS) even for thin films on metal contacts, such as polycrystalline Cu₂SnZnSe₄ grown on molybdenum. In the measurement a reduced THz reflection upon photo-excitation is observed in contrast to increased THz reflection commonly observed on insulating substrates, and which excludes standard analytic R-TRTS analyses. Instead, a numerical transfer matrix method is used to model the THz reflection from which we derive carrier mobilities of 100 cm²/Vs consistent with literature. We show that R-TRTS on metal substrates is ~100x less sensitive compared to measurements on insulating substrates. These sensitivity of these R-TRTS measurements can be increased by using lower substrate refractive indices, lower substrate conductivities, thicker sample layers or higher THz probe frequencies.