Organic Solar Cells In article number 2101084, Peter Müller-Buschbaum and co-workers demonstrated solvent tuning to improve the power conversion efficiency of organic solar cells. The latter are establishing as a promising alternative conventional silicon based Image by Reiner Müller, FRMII.

Solar cells are becoming a highly promising alternative energy source for various markets. In the last five years or so a tremendous amount of research effort has been put into increasing the efficiency of solar cell technology and reducing its manufacturing cost. It is believed that success in both of these areas will further propel its use in various markets. The two major structures commerci...

Controlling size and shape of materials on the nanoscale allows to engineer their physical properties. Indeed nanomaterials offer unique opportunities in engineering, microelectronics, life-science, and renewable energies. Conversion of sunlight to electricity is assumed to be of major importance for the supply of electrical energy for future generations. The actual photovoltaic market is domin...

Developing a better method for the metallization of silicon solar cells is integral part of realizing superior efficiency. Currently, contact realization using screen printing is the leading technology in the silicon based photovoltaic industry, as it is simple and fast. However, the problem with metallization of this kind is that it has a lower aspect ratio and higher contact resistance, which...

Today multiand monocrystaline solar cells are typically wet-chemically textured and coated with a thin layer of silicon nitride to reduce losses due to light reflection and for electrical passivation of the silicon surface. In this paper we investigate a layer stack consisting of silicon nitride (SiNx:H) with a high refractive index at the silicon interface, an intermediate SiNx:H layer and on ...

This review details the design considerations for bottom silicon cell in perovskite/silicon tandems. The highlights shift mindset required when transitioning to mass production of tandem solar cells.

Photovoltaic devices directly convert solar energy into electricity, and thus are highly attractive for a wide range of applications. Although the energy harvested by solar cell technology accounts for only about 0.04% of today’s global energy consumption1, it is one of the fastestgrowing energy sectors, in part because of the vast research and development efforts that have been undertaken in r...

Dielectric gratings are a promising method of achieving light trapping for thin crystalline silicon solar cells. In this paper, we systematically examine the potential performance of thin silicon solar cells with either silicon (Si) or titanium dioxide (TiO2) gratings using numerical simulations. The square pyramid structure with silicon nitride coating provides the best light trapping among al...

The conversion efficiency of thin-film silicon solar cells needs to be improved to be competitive with respect to other technologies. For a more efficient use of light across the solar spectrum, multi-junction architectures are being considered. Light-management considerations are also crucial in order to maximize light absorption in the active regions with a minimum of parasitic optical losses...

We present the optical investigation of a novel back-contacted architecture for solar cells based on a thin barium (di)silicide (BaSi2) absorber. First, through the analysis of absorption limits of different semiconducting materials, we show the potential of BaSi2 for photovoltaic applications. Then, the proposed back contacted BaSi2 solar cell design is investigated and optimized. An implied p...