Determination of photo-induced Seebeck coefficient for hot carrier solar cell applications

Hamidreza Esmaielpour (1) , Daniel Suchet (1) , Laurent Lombez (2) , Amaury Delamarre (3) , Soline Boyer-Richard (4) , Alexandre Beck (4) , Alain Le Corre (4) , Olivier Durand (4) , Jean-Francois Guillemoles (1)

1 IPVF - Institut Photovoltaïque d’Ile-de-France (UMR)
2 IRDEP - Institut de Recherche et Développement sur l'Energie Photovoltaïque
3 UTokyo - The University of Tokyo
4 FOTON - Institut des Fonctions Optiques pour les Technologies de l'informatiON

Determination of Seebeck coefficient is a practical technique to investigate the direct conversion of hot carrier energy to electric voltage. However, this study is challenging, especially in nanostructured materials using traditional measurements via heaters and electric contacts. Here, we investigate photo-induced Seebeck effects of InGaAs multi-quantum-well structure via a contact-less measurement (photoluminescence spectroscopy). We have determined thermodynamic properties of hot carriers via fitting the emitted photoluminescence spectra with the generalized Planck's law. We have observed a linear dependence between the gradient of carrier temperature and the quasi-Fermi level splitting of photo-generated hot carriers at various lattice temperatures, which is associated with thermoelectric effects in the system.

Domaines: Optique [physics.optics]; Micro et nanotechnologies/Microélectronique; Optique / photonique; Traitement du signal et de l'image [eess.SP]

Hamidreza Esmaielpour, Daniel Suchet, Laurent Lombez, Amaury Delamarre, Soline Boyer-Richard, et al.. Determination of photo-induced Seebeck coefficient for hot carrier solar cell applications. 47th Photovoltaic Specialists Conference (PVSC 2020), Jun 2020, Calgary (virtual), Canada. pp.0747-0751, ⟨10.1109/PVSC45281.2020.9300544⟩. ⟨hal-03223077⟩