Sputtered gold nano-structure for photovoltaic applications

Islet ultra-thin gold films are used extensively in various fields of science and technology in recent years. Their widespread use is based on the occurrence of plasmon-polaritons in these films upon irradiation with light. When exposed to light, small gold particles are polarized and electrons within them begin to oscillate together. To produce such nano-dimensional gold islands, we used various deposition techniques: triode sputtering in the low-pressure plane plasma discharge, magnetron sputtering, and thermal evaporation methods. In our experiments, island gold films were embedded into the p-n junction of a silicon photovoltaic structures using the sputtering method. The resulting samples of silicon solar cells with the non-continuous gold interlayer showed a substantial increase in efficiency.