High-Performance Silicon Nanohole Solar Cells

Abstract

We demonstrate Si nanohole arrays as a superior sunlight-absorbing nanostructure for photovoltaic solar cell applications. Under 1 sun AM1.5G illumination, a Si nanohole solar cell with p-n junctions via P diffusion exhibited a open-circuit voltage of 566.6 mV, a short-circuit current density of 32.2 mA/cm(2), and a remarkable power conversion efficiency of 9.51%, which is higher than that of its counterparts based on Si nanowires, planar Si, and pyramid-textured Si. The nanohole array geometry presents a novel and viable method fo cost-efficient solar energy conversion.

All-back-contact ultra-thin silicon nanocone solar cells with 13.7% power conversion efficiency

“…The conventional surface texturing with alkaline or acidic solution for sub-10-mmthick Si substrates requires additional masking steps including photolithography 15 , and it is hard to implement on thin substrates with high yield 16 . In the past several years, significant effort has been focused on enhancing the light absorption by nanoscale light trapping using nanowires 8,[17][18][19] , nanocones [20][21][22] , nanodomes 7 and nanoholes [23][24][25][26] . Despite the exciting success in light trapping, the power conversion efficiencies of nanostructured Si solar cells, however, remain below 19% for thick devices 26 and below 11% for thin devices 27 .…”

Broadband light management using low-Q whispering gallery modes in spherical nanoshells

“…When the structure size is comparable to or even smaller than the wavelength, two main light-trapping approaches, photonic crystals 4,5 and plasmonic nanostructures [6][7][8] have been extensively studied. A photonic crystal can be used either as an omnidirectional lossless reflector 4 or a diffractive element outside the photoactive layer 5,9 , or as a photoactive absorber [10][11][12][13][14][15][16][17] to couple incident light into quasi-guided modes. Plasmonic nanostructures enhance light absorption because they can scatter incident light into wave-guided modes 18 or surface plasmon-polariton modes 19,20 , or increase the optical electric field around nanostructures 21 .…”

Efficient Light Absorption with Integrated Nanopillar/Nanowell Arrays for Three-Dimensional Thin-Film Photovoltaic Applications

“…6,29À32 The significant advantages of the approach developed here rest in the fact that the cost of substrate material and fabrication process is much lower than that of the conventional lithographic methods for fabrication of 3-D NPL and NWL arrays. 7,8,14 In addition, an Al foil is also much lighter and more flexible than the conventional Si and glass substrates, which is attractive for practical applications.…”