Underpotential deposition of selenium and antimony on gold

The present paper is a detailed study on the deposition of Sb2Se3 thin films by electrochemical atomic layer epitaxy (EC-ALE). The related electrochemical aspects have been deeply investigated by means of cyclic voltammetry, anodic potentiodynamic scanning, and coulometry. The UPD layer of Se was obtained by first depositing both UPD Se and a small amount of bulk Se and then stripping the redundant bulk Se in blank solutions. A "two times rinsing" method was developed to avoid the formation of red Se during the rinsing process. The deposition parameters were determined for the first three EC-ALE cycles, and from these values, a nanofilm containing Sb and Se atoms has been obtained. By scanning electron microscopy and coulometry, it was shown that the deposit is compact and it has a stoichiometry very close to that of Sb2Se3. The Raman spectral analyses show that the deposit is made of Sb2Se3 nanoclusters.