Hot carrier solar cells: Principles, materials and design

König, Dirk; Casalenuovo, Kristen; Takeda, Yasuhiko; Conibeer, Gavin; Guillemoles, Jean‐François; Patterson, Robert; Huang, L.; Green, Martin A.

doi:10.1016/j.physe.2009.12.032

Cited by 210 publications

(203 citation statements)

References 18 publications

Supporting

Mentioning

192

Contrasting

Unclassified

Order By: Relevance

“…As shown in the figure, the phonon spectra gaps of β-SbN, AsP, SbP and SbAs (∼220, 170, 150, 90 cm −1 , respectively) are significantly greater than the hardest acoustic mode (∼180, 150, 100, 80 cm −1 , respectively). This can avoid such a "Klemens decay" effectively, 26 which suggests that these materials can be used in high-efficient solar cells application. Furthermore, we have also performed ab initio molecular dynamics (MD) simulations to examine the thermal stability of the single-layer compounds at room temperature.…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Atomically thin binary V–V compound semiconductor: a first-principles study

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Searching the novel 2D semiconductor is crucial to develop the next-generation lowdimensional electronic device. Using first-principles calculations, we propose a class of unexplored binary V-V compound semiconductor (PN, AsN, SbN, AsP, SbP and SbAs) with monolayer black phosphorene (α) and blue phosphorene (β) structure. Our phonon spectra and room-temperature molecular dynamics (MD) calculations indicate that all compounds are very stable. Moreover, most of compounds are found to present a moderate energy gap in the visible frequency range, which can be tuned gradually by in-plane strain. Especially, α-phase V-V compounds have a direct gap while β-SbN, AsN, SbP, and SbAs may be promising candidates of 2D solar cell materials due to a wide gap separating acoustic and optical phonon modes. Furthermore, vertical heterostructures can be also built using lattice matched α(β)-SbN and phosphorene, and both vdW heterostructures are found to have intriguing direct band gap. The present investigation not only broads the scope of layered group V semiconductors but also provides an unprecedented route for the potential applications of 2D V-V families in optoelectronic and nanoelectronic semiconductor devices. Keywords: monolayer compound semiconductor, electronic properties, phosphorene, firstprinciples I. INTRUDUCTIONTwo-dimensional (2D) semiconductors of group V elements including phosphorene, arsenene, and antimonene have been rapidly attracting interest on account of their significant wide-range fundamental band gap, high and anisotropic carrier mobility, linear dichroism, and anisotropic thermal conductivities.1-11 The outstanding properties make these systems as very favorable contenders for 2D electronics applications beyond graphene and transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs).12-14 The success of group V monolayer motivates the ongoing search for related 2D materials with unusual properties. Recently, phosphorene has been extended notably by introducing isoelectronic IV-VI compounds, 15,16 it is thus intriguing to see whether the binary V-V compound monolayers can be achieved.As established in case of phosphorus, group V elements and their compounds can form interesting 2D layered structures such as black-phosphorene-like [α-phase, (No.64)] and blue-phosphorene-like [β-phase, (No.166)], in which the atomic layers are binding with vdW interaction. It's well known that graphene and phosphorene can be mechanically exfoliated from graphite and bulk black phosphorus.17 It is thus viable that the layered black-phosphorene-like (α-phase) and blue-phosphorenelike (β-phase) of AsP and SbAs structures can be made into monolayer AsP and SbAs.18 Very recently, Kou et al. have investigated monolayer arsenic and its compound SbAs, which can be seen as a single-layer of bulk compound with space group of R3m. Except SbAs, P, As and Sb can also be pairwise combined to form various binary compounds. It is expected that these binary V-V materials will exhibit unforeseen properties that present invaluable opportunities for ...

show abstract

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Atomically thin binary V–V compound semiconductor: a first-principles study

et al. 2016

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

“…23 BiB has the largest phononic gap but AlBi, Bi 2 S 5 , Bi 2 O 3 (bismuthine) are also attractive. AlSb has a calculated and measured phononic gap the same size as its acoustic phonon energy.…”

Section: Large Mass Anionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hot carrier solar cell absorbers: materials, mechanisms and nanostructures

et al. 2014

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

The hot carrier cell aims to extract the electrical energy from photo-generated carriers before they thermalize to the band edges. Hence it can potentially achieve a high current and a high voltage and hence very high efficiencies up to 65% under 1 sun and 86% under maximum concentration. To slow the rate of carrier thermalisation is very challenging, but modification of the phonon energies and the use of nanostructures are both promising ways to achieve some of the required slowing of carrier cooling. A number of materials and structures are being investigated with these properties and test structures are being fabricated. Initial measurements indicate slowed carrier cooling in III-Vs with large phonon band gaps and in multiple quantum wells. It is expected that soon proof of concept of hot carrier devices will pave the way for their development to fully functioning high efficiency solar cells.

show abstract

“…8.24 referred to as the Klemens decay, in which a longitudinal optical (LO) phonon located at the Brillouin zone center generates two longitudinal acoustic (LA) phonons with half the energy and opposite momenta [72]. Therefore, when the phononic bandgap between the optical modes and acoustic modes is wide enough so that no LA phonon states exist at the half of the LO phonon energy, the Klemens decay is inhibited [73,74]. The next most likely mechanism is the Ridley decay also depicted in Fig.…”

Section: Bulk Materials With Wide Phononic Bandgapsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Requisites for Highly Efficient Hot-Carrier Solar Cells

Takeda

2013

Lecture Notes in Nanoscale Science and Technology

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

We have constructed new models based on detailed balance of particle and energy fluxes to clarify the operating principle of hot-carrier solar cells (HC-SCs) and find the requisites for high conversion efficiency. Energy dissipation due to thermalization of photogenerated carriers can be significantly reduced, even though the thermalization time is not sufficiently long. Instead, the energy dissipation related to entropy generation associated with hot-carrier extraction is remarkable. The thermalization time must be several nanoseconds to exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit under the 1 sun solar irradiation and over 10 ns to compete against triple-junction solar cells at 1,000 sun. The other requisites unique to hot-carrier extraction are a short carrier equilibration time being around one-thousandth of the thermalization time, and an energy-selection width of energy-selective contacts (ESCs) for mono-energetic carrier extraction, which is needed to match the quasi-Fermi levels in the hot absorber and in the cold electrodes, being narrower than 0.1 eV. It seems extremely challenging to fulfill all the requisites, although investigations for material development as well as new concepts for post conventional HC-SCs are underway. IntroductionIn a conventional solar cell, a photon whose energy is higher than the bandgap of the light-absorbing material used in the cell is absorbed to generate a carrier with an energy equal to the photon energy. However, carrier energies in excess of the bandgap of the absorber immediately dissipate by emitting phonons whose temperature equals the room temperature, namely, thermalization of carriers occurs within several picoseconds in most cases. Therefore, the excess carrier energies cannot be

show abstract

Hot carrier solar cells: Principles, materials and design

Cited by 210 publications

References 18 publications

Atomically thin binary V–V compound semiconductor: a first-principles study

Atomically thin binary V–V compound semiconductor: a first-principles study

Hot carrier solar cell absorbers: materials, mechanisms and nanostructures

Requisites for Highly Efficient Hot-Carrier Solar Cells

Contact Info

Product

Resources

About