Vanadium Dioxide Thin Films for Smart Windows: Numerical Study and Improvement of Their Optical Properties

In recent years, both monoclinic (M) and rutile (R) phase vanadium dioxide (VO2) has attracted considerable interest as a promising candidate for smart windows, owing to the reversible semiconductor-to-metal transition near room temperature. A numerical simulation of the optical properties of VO2 thin films, including index of refraction, coefficient of extinction, reflectance and transmittance, is reported in this work. For this purpose, we used the Model of Drude-Lorentz to calculate coefficients at from the optical parameters n and k using the determination of the dielectric constant ? ( , T). Given that the semiconductor-metal transition temperature of VO2 is 68°C, we studied the effect of thickness on the optical properties of VO2 thin films using transmittance simulations. Hence, a significant change in the optical properties of VO2 thin films has been revealed, which leads to many interesting applications, especially for smart windows.