TY - JOUR A1 - Fischer, Daniel A1 - Hertwig, Andreas A1 - Beck, Uwe A1 - Negendank, Detlef A1 - Lohse, Volkmar A1 - Kormunda, M. A1 - Esser, N. T1 - Dependence of the optical constants and the performance in the SPREE gas measurement on the thickness of doped tin oxide over coatings JF - Applied Surface Science N2 - In this study, thickness related changes of the optical properties of doped tin oxide were studied. Two different sets of samples were prepared. The first set was doped with iron or nickel on silicon substrate with thicknesses of 29–56 nm, the second was iron doped on gold/glass substrate with 1.6–6.3 nm. The optical constants were determined by using spectral ellipsometry (SE) followed by modelling of the dielectric function with an oscillator model using Gaussian peaks. The analysis of the optical constants shows a dependence of the refraction and the absorption on the thickness of the doped tin oxide coating. In addition to the tin oxide absorption in the UV, one additional absorption peak was found in the near-IR/red which is related to plasmonic effects due to the doping. This peak shifts from the near-IR to the red part of the visible spectrum and becomes stronger by reducing the thickness, probably due to the formation of metal nanoparticles in this layer. These results were found for two different sets of samples by using the same optical model. Afterwards the second sample set was tested in the Surface Plasmon Resonance Enhanced Ellipsometric (SPREE) gas measurement with CO gas. It was found that the thickness has significant influence on the sensitivity and thus the adsorption of the CO gas. By increasing the thickness from 1.6 nm to 5.1 nm, the sensing ability is enhanced due to a higher coverage of the surface with the over coating. This is explained by the high affinity of CO molecules to the incorporated Fe-nanoparticles in the tin oxide coating. By increasing the thickness further to 6.3 nm, the sensing ability drops because the layer disturbs the SPR sensing effect too much. T2 - 7th International Conference on Spectroscopic Ellipsometry (ICSE-7) DA - 06.06.2016 KW - Surface plasmon resonance KW - Spectroscopic ellipsometry KW - Doped tin oxide KW - Gas sensing KW - Plasmonic absorption PY - 2017 DO - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsusc.2016.11.188 SN - 0169-4332 VL - 421, Teil B SP - 480 EP - 486 PB - Elsevier B.V. AN - OPUS4-42692 LA - eng AD - Bundesanstalt fuer Materialforschung und -pruefung (BAM), Berlin, Germany ER -