Heterostructure Silicon Solar Cells with Enhanced Power Conversion Efficiency Based on Si_x/Ni³⁺ Self-Doped NiO_x Passivating Contact

Abstract

Developing efficient crystalline silicon/wide-band gap metal-oxide thin-film heterostructure junction-based crystalline silicon ( c -Si) solar cells has been an attractive alternative to the silicon thin film-based counterparts. Herein, nickel oxide thin films are introduced as the hole-selective layer for c -Si solar cells and prepared using the reactive sputtering technique with the target of metallic nickel. An optimal Ni 3+ self-doped NiO x film is obtained by tuning the reactive oxygen atmosphere to construct the optimized c -Si/NiO x heterostructure band alignment. A thin SiO x interlayer was further introduced to reduce the defect of the c -Si/NiO x interface with the UV–ozone (UVO) treatment. The constructed p -type c -Si/SiO x /NiO x /Ag solar cell exhibits an increase in the open voltage from 586 to 611 mV and achieves a 19.2% conversion efficiency.

Electrocatalytic Oxidation of Urea and Ethanol on Two-Dimensional Amorphous Nickel Oxide Encapsulated on N-Doped Carbon Nanosheets

“…This indicates the presence of NiO and a small amount of NiOOH in NiO x /CN x . The small NiOOH formation may take place due to the surface oxidation of the sample. , The deconvoluted C 1s XPS spectrum was fitted with four peaks (Figure d). The peaks at 283.72 and 285.2 eV correspond to the presence of sp 2 carbon and CN bond, whereas the peaks at 287.1 and 289 eV arise due to the presence of C–N or oxygen-containing functional groups.…”

Enhancement of NiOx/Poly‐Si Contact Performance by Insertion of an Ultrathin Metallic Ni Interlayer

“…Zhang et al [ 50 ] could not find any evidence of a nickel silicide after reactive magnetron sputter deposition of 30 nm on c‐Si(p). The lowest contact resistance of their Ag//c‐Si samples was which is in the same order of magnitude as the s‐/poly‐Si and wc‐/poly‐Si contacts without a Ni interlayer, respectively.…”

“…Zhang et al [50] could not find any evidence of a nickel silicide after reactive magnetron sputter deposition of 30 nm NiO x on c-Si(p). The lowest contact resistance of their Ag/NiO x /c-Si samples was 5.4 Ω cm 2 which is in the same order of magnitude as the s-NiO x /poly-Si and wc-NiO x /poly-Si contacts without a Ni interlayer, respectively.…”

All‐Oxide Transparent Photodetector Array for Ultrafast Response through Self‐Powered Excitonic Photovoltage Operation

“…This enhancement of Ni 3+ concentration will increase the work function by deepening the Fermi level, which is beneficial for hole transport. [35] Moreover, there is a higher shift in the Ni 2p 1/2 peak position at Spot-2 (872.78 ± 0.2 eV) relative to Spot-1 (872.04 ± 0.2 eV), which can be attributed to the enhancement of Ni 3+ concentration at the ZnO/NiO interface. Figure 2f shows the peaks at binding energies of 1021.4 ± 0.2 and 1044.4 ± 0.2 eV at Spot-2 corresponding to the Zn 2p 3/2 and Zn 2p 1/2 of ZnO, respectively.…”