Wideband Absorption Enhancement in Laterally Oriented Core-Shell c-Si/a-Si Hexagonal Nanowire Arrays

Abstract

In this paper, the optical properties of laterally oriented core-shell nanowire silicon solar cells (NWSCs) are optimized. The optimum structure consists of an array with non-uniform hexagonal nanowires (NWs). Each NW is constructed from an amorphous silicon layer sandwiched between two crystalline silicon layers. In order to improve the light absorption and short circuit current density (Jsc) of NWSC, a particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm is used to optimize the geometrical parameters of NWs. It is shown that the optimized structure has advantageous performance in terms of light absorption and Jsc. Finally, a multiple structure composed of two NWs with different morphologies and the optimized dimensions is proposed to utilize NWSCs better.

Light absorption enhancement of silicon solar cell based on horizontal nanowire arrays

“…The initial population for x,L,d parameters is produced randomly according to following constraints. (The best value of h is considered to be 200 nm according to similar articles and for the purpose of comparison 42 , 47 . 0<L<600 nm, 0<x<600 nm, 0<d<100 nm…”

“…In Ref. 42, core-shell model NWs with regular and irregular nonuniform hexagonal geometry have been investigated. The design places an amorphous Si (a-Si) layer between crystalline Si (c-Si) layers.…”