Investigation of photosensitive and photodetector characteristics of n-TPA-IFA/p-Si heterojunction structure

n-TPA-IFA organic material was synthesized and deposited on p-Si by spin coating method to produce n-TPA-IFA/p-Si heterojunction diode. We determined that the dielectric constant and energy band gap of TPA-IFA organic material were 3.91 and 3.37 eV by DFT/B3LYP/6-311G(d,p) method using on Gaussian 09 W, respectively, and the carrier type of TPA-IFA organic semiconductor material was also n-type at room temperature from temperature-dependent hall effect measurements. Using forward and reverse bias I–V measurements in the dark and under various light intensities, we examined the key electrical characteristics of the n-TPA-IFA/p-Si heterojunction diode, including $${\Phi }_{b}$$ Φ b and $$n$$ n . It was determined that the rectification ratio (RR) was approximately 10⁴. The reverse current's observed increasing behavior with increasing light indicates that the produced heterojunction diode can be utilized as a photodiode, detector, or sensor. The values of n, $${\Phi }_{b}$$ Φ b , and I_o were determined using I–V data in dark as 1.34, 0.91 eV, and 7.25 9 10–12 A, respectively. On the other hand, when the n-TPA-IFA/p-Si heterojunction diode is exposed to 100 mW/cm² illumination, these parameters were obtained as 1.85, 0.80 eV, and 5.11 9 10–10 A, respectively. Photovoltaic parameters such as short circuit current (I_sc) and open circuit voltage (V_oc) were determined as 0.018 mV, 0.08 A and 0.050 mV, 0.29 A under 20 mW/cm2 light and 100 mW/cm2 light intensity, respectively. The photodetector properties of n-TPA-IFA/p-Si heterostructure were explored at different light intensities, and the photoresponsivity (R), photosensitivity (PS), specific detectivity ($${D}^{*}$$ D ∗ ), and linear dynamic range (LDR) of the heterojunction changed with reverse voltage and light intensity. It was found that as light intensity increased, the linear dynamic range (LDR), a crucial characteristic for image sensors, increased as well (10.15 dB and 18.84 dB for 20 and 100 mW/cm²).