Performances of textured crystalline-silicon (c-Si) solar cells enhanced by silver nanoparticles (Ag-NPs) and indium nanoparticles (In-NPs) plasmonic effects are experimentally demonstrated and compared. Plasmonic nanoparticles integrated into textured c-Si solar cells can further increase the absorption and enhance the short-circuit current density (Jsc) of the solar cell. To examine the profile of the proposed metallic particles, the average diameter and coverage of the In-NPs (Ag-NPs) at 17.7 nm (19.07 nm) and 30.5% (35.1%), respectively, were obtained using scanning electron microscopy. Optical reflectance and external quantum efficiency response were used to measure plasmonic light scattering at various wavelengths. Compared to a bare reference cell, the application of In-NPs increased the Jsc of the cells by 8.64% (from 30.32 to 32.94 mA/cm2), whereas the application of Ag-NPs led to an increase of 4.71% (from 30.32 to 31.75 mA/cm2). The conversion efficiency of cells with embedded In-NPs (14.85%) exceeded that of cells with embedded Ag-NPs (14.32%), which can be attributed to the broadband plasmonic light scattering of the In-NPs.

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This study presents high efficiency InGaP/InGaAs/Ge triple-junction (3-J) solar cells incorporated in the middle cell with layers of InGaAs/GaAs quantum dots (QDs) grown by metal organic chemical vapor deposition to achieve 33.5% conversion efficiency (η) under one-sun AM 1.5 G illumination. We investigated the epitaxial structure and optical and electrical properties of InGaP/InGaAs/Ge 3-J solar cells with and without layers of QDs. We then measured X-ray diffraction (XRD), photoluminescence (PL), optical reflectance, dark and photovoltaic current-voltage (I-V) characteristics, external quantum efficiency (EQE) response, and capacitance-voltage (C-V) as a function of frequency under dark and illuminated conditions at room temperature. The use of 50 pairs of In 0.7 Ga 0.3 As (QD)/GaAs (Barrier) QD structure produced an impressive 35% enhancement in EQE at wavelengths of 900-930 nm. This resulted in a short-circuit current density of 15.43 mA/cm 2 , an open-circuit voltage of 2.54 V, a fill factor of 84.7%, and a η of 33.5%. The 3-J cell with the proposed layers of QDs also demonstrated a 1.0% absolute gain in efficiency compared with a reference cell without QDs. Our XRD, PL, and C-V results revealed that highly stacked InGaAs/GaAs QD layers of high quality can be grown with very little degradation in crystal quality and without the need for strain compensation techniques.

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This study characterized the plasmonic scattering effects of indium nanoparticles (In NPs) on the front surface and silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) on the rear surface of a thin silicon solar cell according to external quantum efficiency (EQE) and photovoltaic current–voltage. The EQE response indicates that, at wavelengths of 300 to 800 nm, the ratio of the number of photo-carriers collected to the number of incident photons shining on a thin Si solar cell was enhanced by the In NPs, and at wavelengths of 1,000 to 1,200 nm, by the Ag NPs. These results demonstrate the effectiveness of combining the broadband plasmonic scattering of two metals in enhancing the overall photovoltaic performance of a thin silicon solar cell. Short-circuit current was increased by 31.88% (from 2.98 to 3.93 mA) and conversion efficiency was increased by 32.72% (from 9.81% to 13.02%), compared to bare thin Si solar cells.