Electrical characteristics of silicon nanowires solar cells with surface roughness

Mohamed Hussein; Mohamed Farhat O. Hameed; Mohamed A. Swillam; S. S. A. Obayya

doi:10.1117/12.2290906

21 February 2018 Electrical characteristics of silicon nanowires solar cells with surface roughness

Mohamed Hussein, Mohamed Farhat O. Hameed, Mohamed A. Swillam, S. S. A. Obayya

Proceedings Volume 10543, Quantum Dots and Nanostructures: Growth, Characterization, and Modeling XV; 105430A (2018) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2290906
Event: SPIE OPTO, 2018, San Francisco, California, United States

Abstract

Silicon nanowires (Si NWs) array have emerged as a promising route on the road to achieve highly efficient solar cells (SCs). The NWs SCs can achieve highly efficient light trapping with reduced cost and material usage. However, it is difficult to fabricate NWs with smoothed surfaces due to the deficiency in the fabrication process. The surface roughness of SCs is an essential parameter of the optoelectronic performance of these devices. In this paper, the effect of surface roughness on the optical and electrical performance of the NW SCs is reported and analyzed. The optical absorption and the generation rates are calculated using 3D finite difference time domain (FDTD) method while the electrical characteristics are calculated using finite element method via Lumerical device software package. In this investigation, short circuit current density, open circuit voltage and power conversion efficiency (PCE) are numerically studied to quantify the electrical performance of the reported structure. The simulation results show that the Si NWs with 10% surface roughness has higher PCE than smoothed Si NWs counterpart by 8.33%. This is due to the multiple scattering between the SiNWs which increases the light absorption and hence the PCE.

Conference Presentation

Citation Download Citation

Mohamed Hussein, Mohamed Farhat O. Hameed, Mohamed A. Swillam, and S. S. A. Obayya "Electrical characteristics of silicon nanowires solar cells with surface roughness", Proc. SPIE 10543, Quantum Dots and Nanostructures: Growth, Characterization, and Modeling XV, 105430A (21 February 2018); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.2290906

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