Microcrystalline Silicon: Material Fabrication And Application In Solar Cells

With high conductivity,stable electrical properties under illumination and widespectral response,microcrystallline silicon(μc-Si:H) thin film emerged as apromising new photovoltaic material in the past years.In this paper,μc-Si:H thin filmfabrication by VHF-PECVD technology was investigated.And a preliminaryresearch of μc-Si:H solar cell fabrication was carried out.The influence of deposition parameters such as silane concentration,substrateheating temperature,plasma power and deposition time on photoelectric andstructural properties of μc-Si:H thin film was investigated.The results are asfollows:With the silane concentration increase,thin film’s photosensitivityincrease,dark conductivity and crystalline volume fraction(XC) decrease.In silaneconcentration range of4%~5%,μc-Si:H/a-Si:H phase transition took place;Withsubstrate heating temperature increase,thin film’s photosensitivity decrease,darkconductivity and XCincrease.The optimized substrate heating temperature is500℃;With plasma power increase,thin film’s photosensitivity decrase,darkconductivity and XCincrease;Thin film’s growth is inhomogeneous.With depositiontime increase,the growth rate increase,photosensitivity decrease,dark conductivityand XC increase.The fabrication of pin μc-Si:H solar cell were investigated.After depositonparameters optimization, solar cell performance of VOC=0.403V，JSC=27.45mA/cm~2，η=4.35%was achieved.