Elsevier, Journal of Non-Crystalline Solids, 19-25(354), p. 2386-2391
DOI: 10.1016/j.jnoncrysol.2007.09.023
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This paper shows how the amorphous/crystalline silicon technology can be implemented in the interdigitated back contact solar cell design. We have fabricated rear-junction, backside contact cells in which both the emitter and the back contact are formed by amorphous/crystalline silicon heterostructure, and the grid-less textured front surface is passivated by a double layer of amorphous silicon and silicon nitride, which also provides an anti-reflection coating. The entire self-aligned mask and photolithography-free process is performed at temperature below 300 °C with the aid of one metallic mask to create the interdigitated pattern. An open circuit voltage of 687 mV has been measured on a 0.5 Ωcm p-type monocrystalline silicon wafer. On the other hand, several technological aspects that limit the fill factor (50%) and the short circuit current density (32 mA/cm2) still need improvement. We show that the uniformity of the deposited amorphous silicon layers is not influenced by the mask-assisted deposition process and that the alignment is feasible. Moreover, this paper investigates the photocurrent limiting factors by one-dimensional modeling and quantum efficiency measurements.