Influence of the intrinsic layer characteristics on a-Si:H p–i–n solar cell performance analysed by means of a computer simulation

Two-dimensional modelling and simulation of hydrogenated amorphous silicon p+–n–n+ solar cell

“…Even though in amorphous silicon, the dangling bond density increases with dopant concentration, in this study we carried out a de-coupled analysis of doping concentration of the absorber layer (N d ) and dangling bond density (N db ). The electrical, optical and structural parameters (Table 1) used for simulating the device performance are adopted from literature [21,[23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30] and in many cases average values of the parameters from these sources are considered. The distribution of states in the energy gap of a-Si:H assumed in the simulation is the general standard model of density of states (DOS) [29,30] and is described by:…”

“…A deeper insight into the effect of the material properties such as doping concentration, dangling bond density of states and free carrier mobilities, and structural properties such as different layers and layer thicknesses on device performance can be obtained by simulation. Device simulation has been used to study a-Si:H p-i-n solar cell performance sensitivity to the material properties [21], to analyze the role of p-layer contact barrier height, contact transport mechanism, p-layer thickness, and p-layer quality on the performance of a-Si:H p-i-n solar cells [22] and influence of the intrinsic layer characteristics on a-Si:H p-i-n solar cell performance [23].…”

Numerical simulation of plasmonic effects in amorphous silicon induced by embedded aluminium nanoparticles

“…However, the poor transport properties and the high defect density of this material limit the thickness of the absorbing layers to about 500 nm. Also the degradation induced by the Staebler-Wronsky effect can in some measure be minimized by the use of a thin intrinsic layer [2]. Such thickness limitation forces the absorption of wavelengths higher!…”

n-PS/a-Si:H heterojunction for device application

“…In general, amorphous silicon films (a-Si:H) grown by plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) technique show a reduced light-induced degradation, an improved reproducibility and a better film thickness uniformity. Besides, a-Si:H is an inexpensive thin-film semiconductor, widely used in UV sensor, color and gas sensors, large-area electronics, photovoltaics and imaging applications [4][5][6][7]. Even though PS plays an important role for the development of gas sensor, insufficient awareness exists on oxygen gas and water vapor sensing properties especially, using nanoporous/amorphous-silicon heterojunction by PECVD technique.…”