Low-Temperature Annealing of n-Type β-FeSi₂/p-Type Si Heterojunctions

Abstract

β-FeSi2 thin films epitaxially grown on Si(111) were annealed in vacuum at different annealing temperatures. The effects of low-temperature postannealing on the photovoltaic properties of β-FeSi2/Si heterojunctions were investigated. The heterojunctions annealed at 300 °C exhibited an apparent improvement in photovoltaic performance as compared with as-grown heterojunctions. This improvement may be due to Fe atoms, that diffused into the Si substrate during β-FeSi2 film deposition, were gettered by the postannealing process.

Simulation of n-β-FeSi2/p-Si heterojunction solar cells based on AFORS-HET

“…5,6 Nowadays, the highest conversion efficiency of β-FeSi 2 /Si heterojunction solar cell is 8.09%, 7 which is far below the theoretical value about 16%-23%. 8 In this study, we analyzed the effects of emitter and interface state on the photovoltaic properties of n-β-FeSi 2 /p-Si by using AFORS-HET program.…”

Study on the n-β-FeSi2/p-Si solar cells under different illuminated directions

“…For photovoltaic application, the n-type ␤-FeSi 2 /p-type Si (n-␤-FeSi 2 /p-Si) heterojunction has been utilized as solar cell structure [7][8][9][10][11]. The n-␤-FeSi 2 /p-Si heterojunction can be fabricated by the deposition of n-type ␤-FeSi 2 thin film on p-type single-crystalline silicon substrate.…”

“…There have been different incident directions for n-␤-FeSi 2 /p-Si heterojunction solar cells used in the literatures. Some reports use illumination of silicide side (called front side in this paper), while the others utilize the silicon side (back side) [7][8][9][10][11]. Table 1 summarizes the illuminated directions and the corresponding photovoltaic properties of n-␤-FeSi 2 /p-Si heterojunction solar cells reported in the literatures.…”

Low‐temperature deposition of high quality β‐FeSi2 films by co‐sputtering of Fe and Si for β‐FeSi2/Si heterojunction solar cell

“…Because of its high absorption coefficient (>10 5 cm -1 ), direct band-gap (~0.85 eV), non-toxicity and abundant Si and Fe resources, β-FeSi 2 has motivated intensive research as a novel thin film photovoltaic material [1,2,5,6]. Up to now, the highest efficiency of β-FeSi 2 thin film solar cell is only 3.7% [1], far from the theoretical efficiency of 16-23% [2].…”

“…It has been proved that controlling the Fe/Si ratio [5] and decreasing the annealing temperature [6] are effective ways to inhibit Fe-Si inter-diffusion and improve optoelectrical properties of β-FeSi 2 films. Thus, the following methods have been adopted in this study.…”