Synthesis and Photoelectrochemical Study of Vertically Aligned Silicon Nanowire Arrays

Abstract

Wiring photoelectrodes: Vertically aligned silicon nanowires were chemically synthesized and tested for solar‐energy harnessing. Growth experiments reveal that such nanowire arrays can be obtained when the growth is slow. Photoelectrochemical studies validate that silicon nanowires are promising candidates for efficient solar cells.

Effect of nanowire length on the performance of silicon nanowires based solar cell

“…Si nanowires (SiNWs) have been considered as novel class of nanostructured materials for highperformance devices [3,4] due to their unique structural, electrical, optical, and thermoelectric properties. Recently, SiNWs have been widely investigation for developing next-generation solar cells to realize both low cost and high efficiency [5][6][7][8][9]. SiNWs can be prepared by two main methods including bottom-up and top-down fabrication.…”

Nanostructured Materials

“…After the deposition of a platinum catalyst on the electroless etched Si nanowires, Peng et al (2009) reported an apparent energy conversion efficiency of up to 8.14 % in Br -/Br 2 electrolyte. Following a similar synthesis method, Yuan et al (2009) reported an efficiency of 10.1 % in 1 M LiClO 4 with Me 2 Fc +/0 redox pair under 100 mW/cm 2 of illumination. Dai et al (2013) used atomic layer deposition (ALD) to deposit Pt nanoparticles, as HER catalyst, on Si nanowires prepared using electroless etching, which gave better turn-on voltages than planar silicon ( Fig.…”

“…After the temperature reaches the Au-Si eutectic point, Au-Si alloy droplets will form, which then adsorbs the Si precursor, resulting in nucleation. Yuan et al (2009) synthesized n-type Si nanowire in CVD system by a slow Si precursor feeding rate to achieve a slow growth rate. Efficient energy conversion was achieved using the highly oriented Si nanowires, with 20 μm length and 200 nm width, in a Me 2 Fc/ Me 2 Fc + electrolyte.…”

“…A wide range of materials have also been synthesized into nanowires and nanorods as photoelectrodes for water splitting, including Si (Peng et al 2009;Yuan et al 2009Yuan et al , 2011Dai et al 2013), Fe 2 O 3 (Beermann et al 2000;Vayssieres et al 2001;Mao et al 2011a, b;Mayer et al 2012), WO 3 (Chakrapani et al 2009;Rao et al 2013), TiO 2 (Feng et al 2008;Shankar et al 2009), ZnO (Yang et al 2009), BiVO 4 (Su et al 2009), and W 2 N (Chakrapani et al 2009) (Fig. 11.4).…”

Enhanced Photoelectrochemical Response of Silicon Nanowire Arrays through Coating the Carbon Shell

“…However, one-dimensional (1D) nanostructures provide a promising and prospective approach to fabricate low-cost and high-performance optoelectronic devices owning to their large length-to-diameter and surface-to-volume ratios. [3][4][5][6] First, excellent light absorption can be realized from 1D nanostructure arrays with a small volume due to their moth-eye-like morphology perfect for antireflection effect 7,8 and light confinement under various optical mechanisms. [9][10][11] Second, the promising orthogonal spatial relation between carrier separation and photon absorption (via radial junction) guarantees a short diffusion distance and an effective carrier collection, allowing the lowgrade materials to be available for high-performance optoelectronic devices.…”