Morphological and optical properties of titanyl phthalocyanine films deposited by supersonic molecular beam epitaxy (SuMBE)

We studied the growth and properties of titanyl phthalocyanine (TiOPc) thin films made by supersonic molecular beam epitaxy (SuMBE). Interesting differences in the growth properties on amorphous (quartz) and crystalline (mica) substrates were found, indicating that SuMBE gives rise to an epitaxy of disc-like organic molecules on crystalline substrates. The combined control of the kinetic energy of the molecules in the supersonic beam specific to SuMBE and of the substrate temperature during deposition are the key parameters used to determine the final properties of the films. We show that SuMBE is a well-suited epitaxy method for the deposition of relatively large organic molecules, leading to layers of thin organic (single-)crystals with lateral dimensions in the micrometer range. By SuMBE we can control the growth of different polymorphs of TiOPc. We found and studied two ways to produce films of red and infrared absorbing phase II TiOPc, which is of interest for applications in organic solar cells.