Fabrication and assembly of ultrathin high-efficiency silicon solar microcells integrating electrical passivation and anti-reflection coatings

Yao, Yuan; Brueckner, Eric; Li, Lanfang; Nuzzo, Ralph G.

doi:10.1039/c3ee42230e

Cited by 34 publications

(49 citation statements)

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“…The cells were placed in polymer waveguide and separated by a certain distance, BSR was added to the back surface of the module, part of the incident light around the cells will be reflected to the cells to realize concentration, the structure was similar to which is shown in Fig. 3 [34], they found that the efficiency of the cell reached the highest under 8 suns [92]. Liu et al made spherical microcells using the P-type silicon spheres with the diameter of about 1 mm, the silicon spheres were made from the scraps generated in the production of CZ wafers.…”

Section: Micro Cellmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review of concentrator silicon solar cells

Xing

Han

Wang

et al. 2015

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

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Section: Micro Cellmentioning

confidence: 99%

A review of concentrator silicon solar cells

Xing

Han

Wang

et al. 2015

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

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“…SEM images on the right side of the Figure 1(b) show the state of the ribbons before and after being released from the wafer. Other masking methods that avoid metal evaporation have also been developed to avoid potential metal contamination issues [27]. These procedures, when repeated, are capable of converting the entire wafer into nanomembranes and therefore hold significant advantages in their cost-effectiveness.…”

Section: Fabrication Of Semiconductor Membranesmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Applications of semiconductor membranes: (a-f) LEDs [12]; (g-k) solar cells [13,27,33,34]; (l-n) a biomimetic camera [35].…”

Section: Figurementioning

confidence: 99%

Nanomembranes and soft fabrication methods for high performance, low cost energy technologies

Yao

Nuzzo

2015

SPIE Proceedings

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The production of integrated electronic circuits provides examples of the most advanced fabrication and assembly approaches that are generally characterized by large-scale integration of high-performance compact semiconductor elements that rely on rigid and essentially planar form factors. New methods of fabricating semiconductor membranes of nanoscale thickness with intrinsic mechanical flexible features are beginning to provide a set of means to lift these constraints by engendering deformable, three-dimensional device configurations that are difficult to achieve with bulkscale materials while retaining capacities for high (or altogether new forms of) electronic and/or optoelectronic performance. Together with enabling means of deterministic assembly realized via the advancing technology of transferprinting, these light-weight nanomembrane elements can be distributed over large areas on a soft, bendable, and even biocompatible secondary substrates with high throughput and yields to realize interesting new functionalities in technology. Exemplary cases include: large-area integrated electro-optical systems laminated onto curvilinear or other 3-D surfaces for use in sensing and imaging with capacities for accommodating demanding forms of mechanical flexure; and unconventional hybrid systems for lighting and photovoltaic energy conversion that provide a potentially transformational approach to supplant current technologies with high performance, low cost alternatives. Taken together, the results of recent research efforts illustrate important opportunities for exploiting advances in materials in synergy with physical means of patterning, fabrication and assembly. In this review, we explore several exemplary applications taken from this work, and specifically highlight scalable approaches to high performance integrated systems for low cost energy technologies. INTRODUCTIONSemiconductor nanomembranes are free-standing films of single crystalline structures with a thickness in the nanometer range. They possess unique properties unavailable in other material formats, such as optoelectronic characteristics associated with quantum confinement effects [1-4] and flexible mechanical features [5, 6] resulting from their ultra-thin geometry. For example, a Si nanomembrane with a thickness around 100 nm has a flexural rigidity that is more than fifteen orders of magnitude lower as compared to a bulk wafer (200 µm thick) [7], allowing it bend to a small radius (less than 10 µm) without cracking [6] and thus making it compatible with common polymeric materials for device assembly and packaging. Integrated with soft substrates, these 2-D membranes have been widely studied in recent years [8,9], providing new functional capacities for accommodating demanding forms of mechanical flexure by circumventing constraints imposed by conventional electronics, where individual rigid (though high-performance) device components (usually at least a couple of hundreds micrometers thick) are fabricated to the highest density possible on a semic...

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“…Here, transfer printing enables high-volume manufacturing and assembly of cells with these small dimensions (26)(27)(28)(29)(30)(31)(32). The ball lenses, as secondary optics, improve manufacturing tolerances, produce uniform irradiation profiles on the cells by correcting for chromatic aberration, and expand the acceptance angle to nearly ±1°even at concentration ratios of >1,000 (22).…”

Section: Significancementioning

confidence: 99%

Concentrator photovoltaic module architectures with capabilities for capture and conversion of full global solar radiation

Lee

Yao

et al. 2016

Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. U.S.A.

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Emerging classes of concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) modules reach efficiencies that are far greater than those of even the highest performance flat-plate PV technologies, with architectures that have the potential to provide the lowest cost of energy in locations with high direct normal irradiance (DNI). A disadvantage is their inability to effectively use diffuse sunlight, thereby constraining widespread geographic deployment and limiting performance even under the most favorable DNI conditions. This study introduces a module design that integrates capabilities in flat-plate PV directly with the most sophisticated CPV technologies, for capture of both direct and diffuse sunlight, thereby achieving efficiency in PV conversion of the global solar radiation. Specific examples of this scheme exploit commodity silicon (Si) cells integrated with two different CPV module designs, where they capture light that is not efficiently directed by the concentrator optics onto large-scale arrays of miniature multijunction (MJ) solar cells that use advanced III-V semiconductor technologies. In this CPV + scheme ("+" denotes the addition of diffuse collector), the Si and MJ cells operate independently on indirect and direct solar radiation, respectively. On-sun experimental studies of CPV + modules at latitudes of 35.9886°N (Durham, NC), 40.1125°N (Bondville, IL), and 38.9072°N (Washington, DC) show improvements in absolute module efficiencies of between 1.02% and 8.45% over values obtained using otherwise similar CPV modules, depending on weather conditions. These concepts have the potential to expand the geographic reach and improve the cost-effectiveness of the highest efficiency forms of PV power generation.photovoltaics | multijunction solar cells | concentration optics | diffuse light capture T he levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) is a primary metric that defines the economic competitiveness of photovoltaic (PV) approaches to electrical power generation (1). As the performance of the highest efficiency single-junction flat-plate PV modules begins to reach theoretical limits, research toward cost reductions in such technologies shifts from performance to topics related to materials utilization and manufacturing (2-5). By contrast, the efficiencies of multijunction (MJ) solar cells based on III-V compound semiconductors continue to improve steadily, at a rate of ∼1% per year over the last 15 y, due largely to progress in epitaxial growth processes, mechanical stacking techniques, and microassembly methods for adding junctions that further maximize light absorption and minimize carrier thermalization losses (6)(7)(8)(9)(10)(11)(12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20). Record MJ cell efficiencies now approach ∼46.0%, with realistic pathways to the 50% milestone (5). For economic deployment, however, the sophistication and associated costs of these cells demand the use of lenses, curved mirrors, or other forms of optics in conjunction with a mechanical tracker to geometrically concentrate incident direct sunlight in a manner tha...

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Fabrication and assembly of ultrathin high-efficiency silicon solar microcells integrating electrical passivation and anti-reflection coatings

Cited by 34 publications

References 49 publications

A review of concentrator silicon solar cells

A review of concentrator silicon solar cells

Nanomembranes and soft fabrication methods for high performance, low cost energy technologies

Concentrator photovoltaic module architectures with capabilities for capture and conversion of full global solar radiation

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