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Enhanced mobility of hydrogenated MO-LPCVD ZnO contacts for high performances thin film silicon solar cells

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 May 2012

L. Ding ,
M. Benkhaira ,
S. Nicolay  and
C. Ballif
L. Ding
Affiliation:
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Institute of Microengineering (IMT), Photovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratory, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, CH-2000 Neuchâtel
M. Benkhaira
Affiliation:
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Institute of Microengineering (IMT), Photovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratory, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, CH-2000 Neuchâtel
S. Nicolay
Affiliation:
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Institute of Microengineering (IMT), Photovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratory, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, CH-2000 Neuchâtel
C. Ballif
Affiliation:
Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), Institute of Microengineering (IMT), Photovoltaics and Thin Film Electronics Laboratory, Rue A.-L. Breguet 2, CH-2000 Neuchâtel
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Abstract

In this contribution, we study the increase in metalorganic-low pressure chemical vapor deposited (MO-LPCVD) ZnO thin films conductivity by hydrogen plasma post-treatment. We show that this improvement is linked to defect passivation at grain boundaries, decreasing the electron traps density and resulting in the almost complete suppression of the electron scattering at grain boundaries. For a 2 μm thick non-intentionally doped ZnO layer, electron mobility reaches after treatment values close to 60 cm2V-1s-1 (corresponding to an increase of 100%), with a carrier density still as low as 3 x1019 cm-3 (+1.5 x1019 cm-3). Such layers have an absorbance below 2-3% in the range of 400 to 1100 nm making them among the most transparent and conductive materials reported so far. In addition, we demonstrate that hydrogen plasma post-treated ZnO layers can be used as front electrode for producing highly transparent and conductive electrodes. Eventually, it is shown that hydrogen plasma treatment can also be used on the complete thin film solar cell stack (back contact and silicon device) to improve the cell performances.

Keywords

transparent conductorchemical vapor deposition (CVD) (deposition)grain boundaries
Type
Articles
Information
MRS Online Proceedings Library (OPL) , Volume 1426: Symposium A – Amorphous and Polycrystalline Thin-Film Silicon Science and Technology–2012 , 2012 , pp. 51 - 56
Copyright
Copyright © Materials Research Society 2012

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References

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