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Cu 2 SnS 3 thin film have been synthesized by solid state reaction under vapour sulphur pressure at 530 C, during 6 h, via a sequentially deposited copper and tin layers Cu/Sn/Cu.Sn/Cu/Sn. The structure and the composition were characterized by X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) and Electron Probe Micro Analysis (EPMA). X-ray diffraction revealed that as the deposited film crystallizes in the cubic structure and the crystallites exhibit preferential 111 orientation of the grains. Moreover, EPMA analysis confirmed that the obtained film is stoichiometric. The SEM study shows the presence of spherical particles of z100e120 nm diameters. The optical absorption coefficient and band gap of the film were estimated by means of transmission and reflection optical measurements at room temperature. A relatively high absorption coefficient in the range of 10 4 cm À1 was indeed obtained and the band gap value is of the order of 1.1 eV. On the other hand, the electrical conductivity of Cu 2 SnS 3 film prepared in the present experiment is suitable for fabricating a thin film solar cell based on not cheaper and environmental friendly material.

In this study, we define a synthetic parameter: optothermal expansivity as a quantitative guide to evaluating and optimizing both the thermal and the optical performance of PV–T functional materials. The definition of this parameter, ψ AB (Amlouk–Boubaker parameter), takes into account the thermal diffusivity and the optical effective absorptivity of the material. The values of this parameter, which seems to be a characteristic one, correspond to the total volume that contains a fixed amount of heat per unit time (m3 s-1) and can be considered as a 3D velocity of the transmitted heat inside the material. As the PV–T combined devices need to have simultaneous optical and thermal efficiency, we try to investigate some recently proposed materials (β- SnS 2, In 2 S 3, ZnS 1-x Se x|0 ≤x<0.5 and Zn -doped thioindate compounds) using the newly established ψ AB /Eg abacus.

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