Optical and structural characterization of thin MoS2 layers on SiO2/Si substrates, towards the development of MoS2/Si heterojunction photovoltaics

In this paper, we present the first steps of a process toward the development of MoS
2
/Si heterojunctions photovoltaics, using 2D 2H-MoS
2
, whose natural abundance and tunable bandgap make it suitable for such application. A focus is made here on the optimization of the MoS
2
material and its deposition process, through preliminary optical and structural characterizations of thin 2H-MoS
2
layers deposited on 80nm SiO
2
on top of Si (001) substrates. Our investigations revealed oxidation of the MoS
2
layers, and limited longitudinal crystallite size, which may strongly affect the band lineup between MoS
2
and Si, and thus, the performance of the solar cell.