• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2013.02a
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• pp.215-216
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• 2013

The silicide is a compound of Si with an electropositive component. Silicides are commonly used in silicon-based microelectronics to reduce resistivity of gate and local interconnect metallization. The popular silicide candidates, CoSi2 and TiSi2, have some limitations. TiSi2 showed line width dependent sheet resistance and has difficulty in transformation of the C49 phase to the low resistive C54. CoSi2 consumes more Si than TiSi2. Nickel silicide is a promising material to substitute for those silicide materials providing several advantages; low resistivity, lower Si consumption and lower formation temperature. Nickel silicide (NiSi) nanowire (NW) has features of a geometrically tiny size in terms of diameter and significantly long directional length, with an excellent electrical conductivity. According to these advantages, NiSi NWs have been applied to various nanoscale applications, such as interconnects [1,2], field emitters [3], and functional microscopy tips [4]. Beside its tiny geometric feature, NW can provide a large surface area at a fixed volume. This makes the material viable for photovoltaic architecture, allowing it to be used to enhance the light-active region [5]. Additionally, a recent report has suggested that an effective antireflection coating-layer can be made with by NiSi NW arrays [6]. A unique growth mechanism of nickel silicide (NiSi) nanowires (NWs) was thermodynamically investigated. The reaction between Ni and Si primarily determines NiSi phases according to the deposition condition. Optimum growth conditions were found at $375^{\circ}C$ leading long and high-density NiSi NWs. The ignition of NiSi NWs is determined by the grain size due to the nucleation limited silicide reaction. A successive Ni diffusion through a silicide layer was traced from a NW grown sample. Otherwise Ni-rich or Si-rich phase induces a film type growth. This work demonstrates specific existence of NiSi NW growth [7].

• Advances in nano research
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• v.3 no.3
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• pp.133-141
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• 2015

Influence of Ag nanoparticles on optical and photovoltaic properties of, silicon substrates, silicon solar cells and glass have been investigated. Silver nanoparticles have been fabricated by evaporation of thin Ag layers followed by the thermal annealing. The surface plasmon resonance peak was observed in the absorbance spectrum at 470 nm of glass with deposited silver nanoparticles. It is demonstrated that deposition of silver nanoparticles on silicon substrates was accompanied with a significant decrease in reflectance at the wavelength 360-1100 nm and increase of the absorption at wavelengths close to the band gap for Si substrates. We studied influence of Ag nanoparticles on photovoltaic characteristics of silicon solar cells without and with common use antireflection coating (ARC). It is shown that silver nanoparticles deposited onto the front surface of the solar cells without ARC led to increase in the photocurrent density by 39% comparing to cells without Ag nanoparticles. Contrary to this, solar cells with Ag nanoparticles deposited on front surface with ARC discovered decrease in photocurrent density. The improved performance of investigated cells was attributed to Ag-plasmonic excitations that reduce the reflectance from the silicon surface and ultimately leads to the enhanced light absorption in the cell. This study showed possibility of application of Ag nanoparticles for the improvement of the conversion efficiency of waferbased silicon solar cells instead of usual ARC.

• Korean Journal of Optics and Photonics
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.162-167
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• 1998

$SiO_xF_y$ optical thin films of lower refractive indices than glass substrates were fabricated by the CF$_4$ ion beam assisted deposition method and the optical, structural and chemical properties of them were investigated. Refractive index of $SiO_xF_y$ films was varied from 1.455 to 1.394 by decreasing the anode voltage or from 1.462 to 1.430 by increasing the current density of end-Hall ion source. FT-IR and XPS analyses show that as the F concentration increases, the Si-O bond at $1080m^{-1}$ shifts to higher wavenumber, the OH bonds are reduced drastically, and the fluorine atoms at the air-film interface are desorbed out by reacting with $H_2O$ in the atmosphere. $SiO_xF_y$ thin films are amorphous by the XRD analysis and have the compressive stress below 0.3 GPa. As an application of $SiO_xF_y$ thin films a two-layer antireflection coating was fabricated using a $SiO_xF_y$ film as a low refractive index layer and a Si film as an absorbing one.

• 한국태양에너지학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2011.11a
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• pp.34-39
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• 2011

Screen printing method is a common way to fabricate the crystalline silicon solar cell with low-cost and high-efficiency. The screen printing metallization use silver paste and aluminum paste for front and rear contact, respectively. Especially the rear contact between aluminum and silicon is important to form the back surface filed (Al-BSF) after firing process. BSF plays an important role to reduces the surface recombination due to $p^+$ doping of back surface. However, Al electrode on back surface leads to bow occurring by differences in coefficient of thermal expansion of the aluminum and silicon. In this paper, we studied the properties of mono crystalline silicon solar cell for rear electrode with aluminum and aluminum-boron in order to characterize bow and BSF of each paste. The 156*156 $m^2$ p-type silicon wafers with $200{\mu}m$ thickness and 0.5-3 ${\Omega}\;cm$ resistivity were used after texturing, diffusion, and antireflection coating. The characteristics of solar cells was obtained by measuring vernier callipers, scanning electron microscope and light current-voltage. Solar cells with aluminum paste on the back surface were achieved with $V_{OC}$ = 0.618V, JSC = 35.49$mA/cm^2$, FF(Fill factor) = 78%, Efficiency = 17.13%.

• Solar Energy
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• v.10 no.3
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• pp.60-65
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• 1990

[ $n^+-p^+$ ] InP homojunction solar cells were fabricated by thermal diffusion of sulphur into a $p^+$-InP wafer($p=4{\times}10^{18}cm^{-3}$), and a SiO film($600{\AA}$ thick) was coated on the $n^+$ layer as an antireflection(AR) coating by an e-beam evaporator. The volume of the cells were $5{\times}5{\times}0.3mm^3$. The front contact grids of the cells with 16 finger pattern of which width and space were $20{\mu}m$ and $300{\mu}m$ respectively, were formed by photo-lithography technique. The junction depth of sulphur were as shallow as about 0.4r m We found out the fabricated solar cells that, with increasing the diffusion time, short circuit current densities($J_{sc}$), series resistances($R_s$) and energy conversion efficiencies(${\eta}$) were increased. The cells show good spectral responses in the region of $5,000-9,000{\AA}$. The short circuit current density, the open circuit voltage( $V_{oc}$), the fill factor(F.F) and the energy conversion efficiency of the cell were $13.16mA/cm^2$, 0.38V, 53.74% and 10.1% respectively.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.29-35
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• 2012

The Hydrogenated silicon nitride (SiNx:H) using plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition is widely used in photovoltaic industry as an antireflection coating and passivation layer. In the high temperature firing process, the $SiN_x:H$ film should not change the properties for its use as high quality surface layer in crystalline silicon solar cells. Initially PECVD-$SiN_x:H$ film trends were investigated by varying the deposition parameters (temperature, electrode gap, RF power, gas flow rate etc.) to optimize the process parameter conditions. Then by varying gas ratios ($NH_3/SiH_4$), the hydrogenated silicon nitride films were analyzed for its optical, electrical, chemical and surface passivation properties. The $SiN_x:H$ films of refractive indices 1.90~2.20 were obtained. The film deposited with the gas ratio of 3.6 (Refractive index=1.98) showed the best properties in after firing process condition. The single crystalline silicon solar cells fabricated according to optimized gas ratio (R=3.6) condition on large area substrate of size $156{\times}156mm$ (Pseudo square) was found to have the conversion efficiency as high as 17.2%. Optimized hydrogenated silicon nitride surface layer and high efficiency crystalline silicon solar cells fabrication sequence has also been explained in this study.

• Korean Chemical Engineering Research
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• v.51 no.6
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• pp.666-670
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• 2013

Recovery method of silicon wafer from defective products generated from manufacturing process of silicon solar cells was studied. The removal effect of the N layer and antireflection coating (ARC) of the waste solar cell were investigated at room temperature ($25^{\circ}C$) by variation of concentration of $H_3PO_4$, $NH_4HF_2$, and concentration and types of chelating agent. Removal efficiency was the best in the conditions; 10 wt% $H_3PO_4$ 2.0 wt% $NH_4HF_2$, 1.5 wt% Hydantoin. Increasing the concentration of $H_3PO_4$, the surface contamination degree was increased and the thickness of the silicon wafe became thicker than the thickness before surface treatment because of re-adsorption on the silicon wafer surface by electrostatic attraction of the fine particles changed to (+). The etching method by mixed solution of $H_3PO_4$-$NH_4HF_2$-chelating agents was expected to be great as an alternative to conventional RCA cleaning methods and as the recycle method of waste solar cells, because all processes are performed at room temperature, the process is simple, and less wastewater, the removal efficiency of the surface of the solar cell was excellent.

• Journal of the Korean Vacuum Society
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• v.11 no.3
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• pp.176-182
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• 2002

Amorphous $TiO_2$ thin films were deposited on glass substrates by ion beam sputtering in which the ratio of $O_2$/Ar gas used as discharged gas was varied from 0 to 2. After optical and microstructure properties and chemical composition of thin films was analyzed, antireflection coating layers were fabricated with $SiO_2$/$TiO_2$ multi-layers. Thin films deposition was performed at room temperature and ion beam voltage and ion current density for sputtering of target were fixed at 1.2 kV and 200 $\mu\textrm{A}/\textrm{cm}^2$, respectively. Refractive indexs of the deposited $TiO_2$films were 2.40-2.45 at a wavelength of 633 nm. $TiO_2$films had high transmission and stoichiometry when ratio of $O_2$/Ar was 1. Rms roughness of deposited $TiO_2$ film was below 7 $\AA$. In excessive $O_2$ environments, however Rms roughness increased over 50 $\AA$. Transmittance decreased by scattering of rough surface. Reflectance of $SiO_2$/$TiO_2$multi-layers was below 1% in visible light.

• Proceedings of the Korean Vacuum Society Conference
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• 2016.02a
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• pp.388-388
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• 2016

Chemical mist deposition (CMD) of poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrene sulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS) was investigated with cavitation frequency f, solvent, flow rate of nitrogen, substrate temperature $T_s$, and substrate dc bias $V_s$ as variables for efficient PEDOT:PSS/crystalline (c-)Si heterojunction solar cells (Fig. 1). The high-speed camera and differential mobility analysis characterizations revealed that average size and flux of PEDOT:PSS mist depend on f, solvent, and $V_s$. The size distribution of mist particles including EG/DI water cosolvent is also shown at three different $V_s$ of 0, 1.5, and 5 kV for a f of 3 MHz (Fig. 2). The size distribution of EG/DI water mist without PEDOT:PSS is also shown at the bottom. A peak maximum shifted from 300-350 to 20-30 nm with a narrow band width of ~150 nm for PEDOT:PSS solution, whose maximum number density increased significantly up to 8000/cc with increasing $V_s$. On the other hand, for EG/water cosolvent mist alone, the peak maximum was observed at a 72.3 nm with a number density of ~700/cc and a band width of ~160 nm and it decreased markedly with increasing $V_s$. These findings were not observed for PEDOT:PSS/EG/DI water mist. In addition, the Mie scattering image of PEDOT:PSS mist under white bias light was not observed at $V_s$ above 5 kV, because the average size of mist became smaller. These results imply that most of solvent is solvated in PEDOT:PSS molecule and/or solvent is vaporized. Thus, higher f and $V_s$ generate preferentially fine mist particle with a narrower band width. Film deposition occurred when $V_s$ was impressed on positive to a c-Si substrate at a Ts of $30-40^{\circ}C$, whereas no deposition of films occurred on negative, implying that negatively charged mist mainly provide the film deposition. The uniform deposition of PEDOT:PSS films occurred on textured c-Si(100) substrate by adjusting $T_s$ and $V_s$. The adhesion of CMD PEDOT:PSS to c-Si enhanced by $V_s$ conspicuously compared to that of spin-coated film. The CMD PEDOT:PSS/c-Si solar cell devices on textured c-Si(100) exhibited a ${\eta}$ of 11.0% with the better uniformity of the solar cell parameters. Furthermore, ${\eta}$ increased to 12.5% with a $J_{sc}$ of $35.6mA/cm^2$, a $V_{oc}$ of 0.53 V, and a FF of 0.67 with an antireflection (AR) coating layer of 20-nm-thick CMD molybdenum oxide $MoO_x$ (n= 2.1) using negatively charged mist of 0.1 wt% 12 Molybdo (VI) phosphoric acid n-Hydrate) $H_3(PMo_{12}O_40){\cdot}nH_2O$ in methanol. CMD. These findings suggest that the CMD with negatively charged mist has a great potential for the uniform deposition of organic and inorganic on textured c-Si substrate by adjusting $T_s$ and $V_s$.