Structural characterization of amorphous carbon films from palmyra sap

Abstract

Carbon-based material and amorphous carbon film were extensively investigated for use in the solar cell. In this work, the amorphous carbon has synthesized from bio-product namelypalmyra wine and palmyra brown sugar that taken from palmyra sap. The amorphous carbon was prepared by carburizing at 250°C. Then, the samples were calcined with varied at 400°C and 600°C for 2 h. Each sample was dissolved into a solvent. The solvents used in this research wereaquadesand DMSO (Dimethyl Sulfoxide). The solutions wereexfoliated by using an ultrasonic cleaner for 2 h and then centrifuged at 4000 rpm for 30 min. The amorphous carbonin the liquidwas deposited by a spin coating method on the ITO substrate. The XRD data showed that the patterns of the powder samples have a wide spectrum range at 2θ around 15-30°so the samples were amorphous. The FTIR absorption spectra in transmittance mode show that the sample dissolved into aquades (PBA) has functional group bonds such as O-H, C=C, C-C, C-H, C-O, C-N, N-H and C-I. On the other hand, the sample dissolved into DMSO (PBD) has functional group bonds such as O-H, C-H, O-H, -C=C-, C-H, C=C, C-C, C-N, N-H, and C-I in the range 500-4000 cm-1. Microstructural characterization using SEM shows that the surface morphology of the PWA and PB samples were a lump and nodular, respectively.