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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…
High density and uniformity sub-100nm surface oxidized silicon nanocone forest structure is created and integrated onto the existing texturization microstructures on photovoltaic device surface by a one-step high throughput plasma enhanced…
The integration of two-dimensional (2D) periodic nanopattern defined by nanoimprint lithography and dry etching into aluminum induced crystallization (AIC) based polycrystalline silicon (Poly-Si) thin film solar cells is investigated…
A 2-D photonic crystal was integrated experimentally into a thin-film crystalline-silicon solar cell of 1-{\mu}m thickness, after numerical optimization maximizing light absorption in the active material. The photonic crystal boosted the…
We propose a frequency selective light trapping scheme that enables the creation of more visually-transparent and yet simultaneously more efficient semitransparent solar cells. A nanoparticle scattering layer and photonic stack back…
Many promising approaches for designing interactions of synthetic materials with light involve solid optical monocrystals and nanofabricated photonic crystal structures with spatially periodic variations of refractive index. Although their…
A method to engineer the refractive indices of functional materials (TiO2, ZnO, SnO2, SiO2), by nanostructuring in the deep sub-wavelength regime (<20nm), is presented. Block-copolymer templating combined with a wet processing route is used…
Thin-film solar cells that are considered as the second generation of solar cells are known for their low cost and acceptable efficiency. In this technology, semiconductor layers with a thickness of micrometer are deposited on thick enough…
Silica aerogels are nanoporous materials with exceptional optical and physical properties, making them promising candidates to enhance solar cell efficiency as antireflective coatings. This study synthesized hydrophobic silica aerogel thin…
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…
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…
Hydrogenated amorphous silicon alloy films are generally deposited by radio frequency plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (RF PECVD) technique on various types of substrates. Generally it is assumed that film quality remains unchanged…
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)…
We present state-of-the-art first-principle calculations of the electronic and optical properties of silicon allotropes with interesting characteristics for applications in thin-film solar cells. These new phases consist of distorted sp$^3$…
While various nanophotonic structures applicable to relatively thin crystalline silicon-based solar cells were proposed to ensure effective light in-coupling and light trapping in the absorber, it is of great importance to evaluate their…
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…
Sub-micrometer thin films are promising platforms for emerging flexible photovoltaic devices. Although the current market already produces efficient solar cells, the average wafer thickness of these devices remains far from the…
Theoretically and experimentally we have proved the existence of optimal thickness of the porous layer used as an anti-reflection coating in solar cells. We have taken into account the joint mechanisms of generation and recombination of…
Nano-scaled dielectric and metallic structures are popular light tapping structures in thin-film solar cells. However, a large parasitic absorption in those structures is unavoidable. Most schemes based on such structures also involve the…
In this paper, we simulate a front surface inverted pyramidal grating texture on 2 to 400 micron thick silicon and optimize it to derive maximum photocurrent density from the cell. We identify a one size fits all front grating period of…