Gold-Free Fully Cu-Metallized InGaP/InGaAs/Ge Triple-Junction Solar Cells

Author

Ching-Hsiang Hsu ; Chang, Edward Yi ; Hsun-Jui Chang ; Hung-Wei Yu ; Hong Quan Nguyen ; Chen-Chen Chung ; Jer-Shen Maa ; Pande, Krishna

Author_Institution

Inst. of Lighting & Energy Photonics, Nat. Chiao Tung Univ., Hsinchu, Taiwan

Volume

35

Issue

12

fYear

2014

fDate

Dec. 2014

Firstpage

1275

Lastpage

1277

Abstract

Copper contacts and interconnects were developed for GaAs and Ge for low-cost solar cell application. In addition, thermally annealed Pd/Ge and Pt/Ti/Pt metallizations were created for ohmic contacts to n-GaAs and p-Ge with contact resistance of 4.4 × 10^-6 and 6.9 × 10^-6 Ωcm², respectively. Utilizing such metallization structure for InGaP/InGaAs/Ge triple-junction device structure solar cells were fabricated that delivered conversion efficiency of 23.11%, which is average efficiency for the above device structure.

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; annealing; contact resistance; copper; elemental semiconductors; gallium arsenide; gallium compounds; germanium; indium compounds; interconnections; ohmic contacts; p-n junctions; palladium; platinum; semiconductor device metallisation; solar cells; titanium; Cu-Pd-InGaP-InGaAs-Ge; Cu-Pt-Ti-Pt-InGaP-InGaAs-Ge; conversion efficiency; copper contact; gold-free fully metallized triple-junction solar cell device fabrication; interconnect low-cost solar cell application; metallization structure; ohmic contact resistance; thermal annealing; Annealing; Gallium arsenide; III-IV semiconductor materials; Indium gallium arsenide; Ohmic contacts; Photovoltaic cells; III-V concentrator solar cell; copper metallization; low cost; low cost.; ohmic contact;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/LED.2014.2361923

Filename

6948363