Nanoscale Res Lett

2013, 8:33.CrossRef 15. Pethe SA, Takahashi E, Kaul A, Dhere NG: Effect of sputtering process parameters on film properties of molybdenum back contact. Solar Energy Mater Sol Cells 2012, 100:1–5.CrossRef 16. Cullity BD, Stock SR: Elements of X-Ray Diffraction. 3rd Rigosertib solubility dmso edition. Upper Saddle River: Prentice-Hall Inc; 2001:167–171. 17. Igasaki Y, Saito H: Substrate temperature dependence of electrical properties of ZnO:Al epitaxial films on sapphire (1210). J Appl Phys 1991, 69:2190–2195.CrossRef Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests. Authors’ contributions JCL proposed an idea to fabricate the CIS absorber layers and helped in the Mo deposition. CCD, JJL, find more and

YLC participated in the experimental process and helped in the data analysis. CFY also proposed an idea to fabricate the CIS absorber layers and wrote the paper. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.”
“Background Heterogeneous photocatalysis selleck chemicals has been extensively investigated by researchers for the degradation of organic pollutants [1, 2]. As a very promising photocatalyst, TiO2 shows high chemical stability, high photocatalytic activity, low cost, and non-toxicity. However, the materials exhibit photocatalytic activities only under UV light at wavelengths of less than 387.5 nm. UV light accounts for only 4% of the solar light. Therefore, synthesizing a TiO2 photocatalyst with visible-light responses for environmental

protection is important [3–7]. The catalytic activity of TiO2 is easily influenced by the agglomeration of the TiO2 particles. TiO2 thin films are considered excellent photocatalytic materials because of the large specific surface area of their particles, which improves catalytic efficiency Anidulafungin (LY303366) through increased contact with pollutants [8]. To improve the catalytic performance of TiO2 photocatalyst, researchers have investigated many methods to modify Ti. Doping with metal ions, such as the rare earth metal ions (Er, Yb, Y, and Eu) or the noble metal crystals, for example, has been performed to enhance catalytic efficiency of Ti [9–12]. However, rare metal dopant photocatalysts have low thermostability and short life spans. Furthermore, rare metals and noble metals are expensive. Several studies report that the doping of TiO2 with non-metals, such as carbon, nitrogen, sulfur, boron, and fluorine, shifts the optical absorption edge of TiO2 toward lower energies, which increases its photocatalytic activity in the visible-light region [13]. The nitrogen process is a low-cost and efficient way of modifying TiO2 to develop TiO2 fiber catalysts. The catalytic activity of TiO2 is easily affected by the agglomeration of TiO2 particles. Thus, TiO2 thin films are considered as favorable photocatalytic materials.