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Absorption and emission in inorganic bipolar solar cells based on low dimensional structures exhibiting the effects of quantum confinement is investigated in the framework of a comprehensive microscopic theory of the optical and electronic…
We show that solar neutrino experiments set an upper limit of 7.8% (7.3% including the recent KamLAND measurements) to the fraction of energy that the Sun produces via the CNO fusion cycle, which is an order of magnitude improvement upon…
The Shockley-Queisser limit is one of the most fundamental results in the field of photovoltaics. Based on the principle of detailed balance, it defines an upper limit for a single junction solar cell that uses an absorber material with a…
Ever science the invention of solar cells, thermodynamics has been used to assess their performance limits, guiding advances in materials science and photovoltaic technology to reduce the gap between the practical efficiencies and the…
Photoelectrochemical (PEC) water splitting to generate hydrogen is one of the most studied methods for converting solar energy into clean fuel because of its simplicity and potentially low cost. Despite over 40 years of intensive research,…
We use a rigorous electromagnetic approach to analyze the fundamental limit of light-trapping enhancement in grating structures. This limit can exceed the bulk limit of 4n^2, but has significant angular dependency. We explicitly show that…
Light management is of great importance to photovoltaic cells, as it determines the fraction of incident light entering the device. An optimal pn-junction combined with an optimal light absorption can lead to a solar cell efficiency above…
In this paper we present and experimentally validate a low-cost design of a spectral splitting concentrator for the efficient conversion of solar energy. The optical device consists of a dispersive prismatic lens made of polycarbonate…
We propose a concentrated thermionic emission solar cell design, which demonstrates a high solar-to-electricity energy conversion efficiency larger than 10\% under 600 sun, by harnessing the exceptional electrical, thermal and radiative…
Hot-carrier solar cells use the photon excess energy, that is, the energy exceeding the absorber bandgap, to do additional work. These devices have the potential to beat the upper limit for the photovoltaic power conversion efficiency set…
The Shockley and Queisser limit, a well-known efficiency limit for a solar cell, is based on unrealistic physical assumptions and its maximum limit is seriously overestimated. To understand the power loss mechanisms of record-efficiency…
Hot carrier solar cells allow potential efficiency close to the thermodynamical limit in ideal conditions. However, the feasability of such devices has not been clearly stated so far and only ideal cells were considered in previous studies.…
We re-examine solar emission of hidden photons gamma' (mass m) caused by kinetic mixing. We calculate the emission rate with thermal field theory methods and with a kinetic equation that includes "flavor oscillations" and photon absorption…
Graphene has been intensively studied in photovoltaics focusing on emerging solar cells based on thin films, dye-sensitized, quantum dots, nanowires, etc. However, the typical efficiency of these solar cells incorporating graphene are below…
Significant progress has been made in the field of thermophotovoltaics, with efficiency recently rising to over 40% due to improvements in cell design and material quality, higher emitter temperatures, and better spectral management.…
We derive upper bounds to free-space concentration of electromagnetic waves, mapping out the limits to maximum intensity for any spot size and optical beam-shaping device. For sub-diffraction-limited optical beams, our bounds suggest the…
Organic solar cells (OSCs) are uniquely suited for semitransparent applications due to their adjustable absorption spectrum. However, most high-performance semitransparent cells reported to date are based on materials that have shown high…
Photosynthesis converts sunlight into the chemical free energy that feeds the Earth's biosphere, yet at levels much lower than what thermodynamics would allow for. I propose here that photosynthesis is nevertheless thermodynamically…
A high photon to electricity conversion efficiency of 47.2082% was achieved by a novel combination of In0.51Ga0.49P, GaAs, In0.24Ga0.76As and In0.19Ga0.81Sb subcell layers in a quadruple junction solar cell design. The electronic bandgap of…
The selfconsistent model for the temperature dependence of photoconversion efficiency $\eta$ for highly efficient silicon solar cells (SCs) is developed. It is demonstrated that effect of the efficiency decrease due to increasing…