This technology is based on AstroPower's electrostatic bonding and silicon solar cell processing techniques. Electrostatic bonding allows silicon wafers to be permanently attached to a thermally matched glass superstrate and processed to form the monolithically interconnected devices. These devices can be tailored for space and terrestrial applications. The costs of the monolithic interconnection compare favorably to labor intensive, conventionally strung solar cell arrays. Voltage and current outputs can be varied without varying the number of fabrication steps.Prototypes have demonstrated efficiencies greater than 1 1 %. The monolithic approach has a number of inherent advantages for space and terrestrial photovoltaic products.
Progress on mid-infrared photodetectors fabricated by the liquid phase epitaxial growth of GaInAsSb, InAsSbP, and AlGaAsSb on GaSb and InAs substrates is reported. GaInAsSb p/n and p-i-n detectors, InAsSbP p/n detectors and AlGaAsSb/GaInAsSb avalanche photodiode (APD) structures were fabricated. Preliminary results indicate that these devices can have higher detectivity with lower cooling requirements than commercially available detectors in the same wavelength range. Infrared p/n junction detectors made from GaInAsSb and InAsSbP showed cut-off wavelengths of 2.3.μm and 2.8. μm respectively. Room temperature background noiselimited detectivity (D*BLIP) of 4 × 1010 cmHz1/2/W for GaInAsSb detectors and 4 × 108 cmHz1/2/W for InAsSbP was measured. Room-temperature avalanche multiplication gain of 20 was measured on AlGaAsSb/GaInAsSb avalanche photodiodes.
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