Light trapping effect of heterojunction AlGaN nanowires adsorbed by metal nanoparticles

Light trapping effect using rough surface transparent conductive oxide (TCO) is one of the best ways to achieve high efficiency thin-film silicon solar cells. Several types of rough ZnO film fabricated by metal organic chemical vapor deposition technique onto the glass, which are etched by reactive ion etching, have been proposed so far as promising TCO substrates. In this paper, newly developed ZnO substrate with extremely high light scattering property comparing with typical pyramidal texture one was developed. By applying this newly developed ZnO substrate to the solar cell, higher short circuit current of about 2% has been achieved comparing with typical pyramidal texture one without sacrificing other parameters. This result showed that the newly developed substrate is suitable as a front TCO substrate for high performance thin-film silicon solar cell.

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Amorphous Silicon Solar Cells With Silver Nanoparticles Embedded Inside the Absorber Layer

MRS Proceedings ◽

10.1557/proc-1245-a07-20 ◽

2010 ◽

Vol 1245 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Rudi Santbergen ◽

Renrong Liang ◽

Miro Zeman

Keyword(s):

Silver Nanoparticles ◽

Solar Cells ◽

Amorphous Silicon ◽

Metal Nanoparticles ◽

Light Trapping ◽

Silicon Layer ◽

Absorber Layer ◽

Silicon Solar Cells ◽

Bottom Part ◽

Embedded Particles

AbstractA novel light trapping technique for solar cells is based on light scattering by metal nanoparticles through excitation of localized surface plasmons. We investigated the effect of metal nanoparticles embedded inside the absorber layer of amorphous silicon solar cells on the cell performance. The position of the particles inside the absorber layer was varied. Transmission electron microscopy images of the cell devices showed well defined silver nanoparticles, indicating that they survive the embedding procedure. The optical absorption of samples where the silver nanoparticles were embedded in thin amorphous silicon layer showed an enhancement peak around the plasmon resonance of 800 nm. The embedded particles significantly reduce the performance of the fabricated devices. We attribute this to the recombination of photogenerated charge carriers in the absorber layer induced by the presence of the silver nanoparticles. Finally we demonstrate that the fabricated solar cells exhibit tandem-like behavior where the silver nanoparticles separate the absorber layer into a top and bottom part.

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Disorder Improves Light Absorption in Thin Film Silicon Solar Cells with Hybrid Light Trapping Structure

International Journal of Optics ◽

10.1155/2016/9371608 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 2016 ◽

pp. 1-8 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Yanpeng Shi ◽

Xiaodong Wang ◽

Fuhua Yang

Keyword(s):

Thin Film ◽

Solar Cells ◽

Periodic Structures ◽

Light Trapping ◽

Random Effect ◽

Large Field ◽

Silicon Solar Cells ◽

Trapping Effect ◽

Thin Film Silicon ◽

The Impact

We present a systematic simulation study on the impact of disorder in thin film silicon solar cells with hybrid light trapping structure. For the periodical structures introducing certain randomness in some parameters, the nanophotonic light trapping effect is demonstrated to be superior to their periodic counterparts. The nanophotonic light trapping effect can be associated with the increased modes induced by the structural disorders. Our study is a systematic proof that certain disorder is conceptually an advantage for nanophotonic light trapping concepts in thin film solar cells. The result is relevant to the large field of research on nanophotonic light trapping which currently investigates and prototypes a number of new concepts including disordered periodic and quasiperiodic textures. The random effect on the shape of the pattern (position, height, and radius) investigated in this paper could be a good approach to estimate the influence of experimental inaccuracies for periodic or quasi-periodic structures.

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