Related papers: Light trapping in solar cells at the extreme coupl…
We investigate the angular behavior of the upper bound of absorption provided by the guided modes in thin film solar cells. We show that the 4n^2 limit can be potentially exceeded in a wide angular and wavelength range using two-dimensional…
Light trapping in solar cells allows for increased current and voltage, as well as reduced materials cost. It is known that in geometrical optics, a maximum 4n^2 absorption enhancement factor can be achieved by randomly texturing the…
Light trapping for solar cells can reduce production cost and improve energy conversion efficiency. Understanding some of the basic theoretical constraints on light trapping is therefore of fundamental importance. Here, we develop a general…
We propose an efficient plasmonic structure consisting of metal strips and thin-film silicon for solar energy absorption. We numerically demonstrate the absorption enhancement in symmetrical structure based on the mode coupling between the…
Coating and reflecting thin films for energy harvesting purposes are interesting topics in both theoretical and experimental research. The thin film could help to enhance the absorption of the system via its specific optical properties…
We report on very high enhancement of thin layer's absorption through band-engineering of a photonic crystal structure. We realized amorphous silicon (aSi) photonic crystals, where slow light modes improve absorption efficiency. We show…
We demonstrate the optical absorption has been enhanced in the small molecule organic solar cells by employing trapezoid grating structure. The enhanced absorption is mainly attributed to both waveguide modes and surface plasmon modes,…
Understanding the maximal enhancement of solar absorption in semiconductor materials by light trapping promises the development of affordable solar cells. However, the conventional Lambertian limit is only valid for idealized material…
Epitaxially-grown quantum well and quantum dot solar cells suffer from weak light absorption, strongly limiting their performance. Light trapping based on optical resonances is particularly relevant for such devices to increase light…
Thin film solar cells have been attractive for decades in advanced green technology platforms due to its possibilities to be integrated with buildings and on-chip applications. However, the bottleneck issues involved to consider the current…
We address the question of the optimal broadband absorption of waves in an open, dissipative system. We develop a general framework for absorption induced by multiple overlapping resonances, based on quasi-normal modes and radiative and…
We report on the fabrication of two-dimensional periodic photonic nanostructures by nanoimprint lithography and dry etching, and their integration into a 1-{\mu}m-thin mono-crystalline silicon solar cell. Thanks to the periodic…
Since thin-film silicon solar cells have limited optical absorption, we explore the effect of a nanostructured back reflector to recycle the unabsorbed light. As a back reflector we investigate a 3D photonic band gap crystal made from…
Nano-scaled metallic or dielectric structures may provide various ways to trap light into thin-film solar cells for improving the conversion efficiency. In most schemes, the textured active layers are involved into light trapping structures…
The absorption of thin hydrogenated amorphous silicon layers can be efficiently enhanced through a controlled periodic patterning. Light is trapped through coupling with photonic Bloch modes of the periodic structures, which act as an…
The design and fabrication of a metal-dielectric-metal absorber that achieves strong absorption from the ultraviolet (UV) to the near-infrared (near-IR) spectrum are presented. The proposed nanostructure consists of a periodic titanium (Ti)…
Random surface texturing of an optically-thick film to increase the path length of scattered light rays, first proposed nearly thirty years ago, has thus far remained the most effective approach for photon absorption over the widest set of…
This paper presents modelled results for optical absorption in ultra-thin films of nickel, gold and silver across the solar spectrum. It is found in the case of nickel there is an optimum thickness for maximum solar absorption around…
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…
It is currently possible to fabricate crystalline silicon solar cells with the absorber thickness ranging from a few hundreds of micrometers (conventional wafer-based cells) to devices as thin as $1\,\mu\mathrm{m}$. In this work, we use a…