High throughput combinatorial screening of semiconductor materials

This article provides an overview of an advanced combinatorial material discovery platform developed recently for screening semiconductor materials with properties that may have applications ranging from radiation detectors to solar cells. Semiconductor thin-film libraries, each consisting of 256 materials of different composition arranged into a 16×16 matrix, were fabricated using laser-assisted evaporation process along with a combinatorial mechanism to achieve variations. The composition and microstructure of individual materials on each thin-film library were characterized with an integrated scanning micro-beam x-ray fluorescence and diffraction system, while the band gaps were determined by scanning optical reflection and transmission of the libraries. An ultrafast ultraviolet photon-induced charge probe was devised to measure the mobility and lifetime of individual thin-film materials on semiconductor libraries. Selected results on the discovery of semiconductors with desired band gaps and transport properties are illustrated.