Microcrystalline silicon solar cells deposited using a plasma process excited by tailored voltage waveforms

E.V. Johnson , Pierre-Alexandre Delattre , Jean-Paul Booth (1)

1 LPP - Laboratoire de Physique des Plasmas

Thin film solar cells in a p-i-n structure with an absorbing layer of intrinsic hydrogenated microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) deposited through plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition excited by tailored voltage waveforms have been prepared. The use of an asymmetric voltage waveform decouples the ion-bombardment energy at the growth surface from the injected power and allows the growth of good quality μc-Si:H at reasonable deposition rates (3 Å/s) using low pressure, powder-free conditions. Unoptimized photovoltaic devices with an efficiency of 6.1% are demonstrated using an i-layer deposited at 1.3 Å/s and a process pressure of 500 mTorr.

Domaines: Physique des plasmas [physics.plasm-ph]

E.V. Johnson, Pierre-Alexandre Delattre, Jean-Paul Booth. Microcrystalline silicon solar cells deposited using a plasma process excited by tailored voltage waveforms. Applied Physics Letters, 2012, 100, pp.133504. ⟨10.1063/1.3699222⟩. ⟨hal-01549437⟩