Plasmonics.png
FA info icon.svg Angle down icon.svg Source data
Type Paper
Cite as Citation reference for the source document. Chenlong Zhang, Jephias Gwamuri, Sandra Cvetanovic, Mehdi Sadatgol, Durdu O Guney and Joshua M Pearce Enhancement of hydrogenated amorphous silicon solar cells with front-surface hexagonal plasmonic arrays from nanoscale lithography. Journal of Optics, 19, 075901 (2017) https://doi.org/10.1088/2040-8986/aa7291 open access

The study first uses numerical simulations of hexagonal triangle and sphere arrays to optimize the performance of hydrogenated amorphous silicon (a-Si:H) photovoltaic devices. The simulations indicated the potential for a sphere array to provide optical enhancement (OE) up to 7.4% compared to a standard cell using a nanosphere radius of 250 nm and silver film thickness of 50 nm. Next a detailed series of a-Si:H cells were fabricated and tested for quantum efficiency and characteristic and current–voltage (I–V) profiles using a solar simulator. Triangle and sphere array based cells, as well as the uncoated reference cells are analyzed and the results find that the simulation does not precisely predict the observed enhancement, but it forecasts a trend and can be used to guide fabrication. In general, the measured OE follows the simulated trend: (1) for triangular arrays no enhancement is observed and as the silver thickness increases the more degradation of the cell; (2) for annealed arrays both measured and simulated OE occur with the thinner silver thickness. Measured efficiency enhancement reached 20.2% and 10.9% for nanosphere diameter D = 500 nm, silver thicknesses h = 50 nm and 25 nm, respectively. These values, which surpass simulation results, indicate that this method is worth additional investigation.

Keywords[edit | edit source]

Absorption ; Metamaterials ; Solar cells ; Semiconductors ; Skin ; Absorbance ; Metals ; Engineering ; Light emitting diodes ; Optoelectronic devices; amorphous silicon; plasmonics; hexagonal array; nanosphere lithography; scattering; photovoltaic

See also[edit | edit source]

FA info icon.svg Angle down icon.svg Page data
Authors Joshua M. Pearce
License CC-BY-SA-3.0
Language English (en)
Related 0 subpages, 16 pages link here
Impact 294 page views
Created June 6, 2017 by Joshua M. Pearce
Modified February 23, 2024 by Maintenance script
Cookies help us deliver our services. By using our services, you agree to our use of cookies.