• Journal of the Korean Crystal Growth and Crystal Technology
• /
• v.32 no.4
• /
• pp.121-127
• /
• 2022

β-Gallium oxide (Ga₂O₃), an ultra-wide bandgap semiconductor, has attracted great attention due to its promising applications for high voltage power devices. The most stable phase among five different polytypes, β-Ga₂O₃ has the wider bandgap of 4.9 eV and higher breakdown electric field of 8 MV/cm. Furthermore, it can be grown from melt source, implying higher growth rate and lower fabrication cost than other wide bandgap semiconductors such as SiC, GaN and diamond for the power device applications. In this study, β-Ga₂O₃ bulk crystals were grown by the edge-defined film-fed growth (EFG) process. The growth direction and the principal surface were set to be the [010] direction and the (100) plane of the β-Ga₂O₃ crystal, respectively. The spectra measured by Raman an alysis could exhibit the crystal phase an d impurity dopin g in the β-Ga₂O₃ ingot, and the crystallinity quality and crystal direction were analyzed using high-resolution X-ray diffraction (HRXRD). The crystal quality and various properties of as-grown β-Ga₂O₃ ribbon was systematically analyzed in order to investigate the spatial variation in entire crystal grown by EFG method.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
• /
• v.34 no.4
• /
• pp.251-255
• /
• 2021

a-Si is commonly considered as a primary candidate for the formation of passivation layer in heterojunction (HIT) solar cells. However, there are some problems when using this material such as significant losses due to recombination and parasitic absorption. To reduce these problems, a wide bandgap material is needed. A wide bandgap has a positive influence on effective transmittance, reduction of the parasitic absorption, and prevention of unnecessary epitaxial growth. In this paper, the adoption of a-SiO_x:H as the intrinsic layer was discussed. To increase lifetime and conductivity, oxygen concentration control is crucial because it is correlated with the thickness, bonding defect, interface density (D_it), and band offset. A thick oxygen-rich layer causes the lifetime and the implied open-circuit voltage to drop. Furthermore the thicker the layer gets, the more free hydrogen atoms are etched in thin films, which worsens the passivation quality and the efficiency of solar cells. Previous studies revealed that the lifetime and the implied voltage decreased when the a-SiOx thickness went beyond around 9 nm. In addition to this, oxygen acted as a defect in the intrinsic layer. The D_it increased up to an oxygen rate on the order of 8%. Beyond 8%, the D_it was constant. By controlling the oxygen concentration properly and achieving a thin layer, high-efficiency HIT solar cells can be fabricated.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Surface Engineering Conference
• /
• 2018.06a
• /
• pp.50.2-50.2
• /
• 2018

The demand for steady and dependable power sources is very high in the field of sustainable energy because of the limited amount of fossil fuels reserves. Among several sustainable alternatives, solar energy may be the most efficient solution because it constitutes the largest renewable energy source. So far, the only practical way to store such large amounts of energy has been to use a chemical energy carrier likewise a fuel. In various solar energy to power conversion systems, the photoelectrochemical (PEC) splitting of water into hydrogen and oxygen by the direct use of solar energy is an ideal process. It is a renewable method of hydrogen production integrated with solar energy absorption and water electrolysis using a single photoelectrode. Previous studies on photoelectrode films for PEC water splitting cells have been mainly focused on synthesizing oxide semiconductors with wide band gaps, such as TiO2(3.2eV), WO3(2.8eV), and Fe2O3(2.3eV). Unfortunately, these pristine oxide photoanodes without any catalysts have relatively low photocurrent densities because of the inherent limitation of insufficient visible light absorption due to the wide bandgap. Specifically, there is a tradeoff between high photocurrent and photoelectrochemical corrosion behavior, which is representative of figures of meritf or PEC materials.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Telematics and Electronics D
• /
• v.35D no.6
• /
• pp.79-91
• /
• 1998

Design principles for high-brightness ligh-temitting diodes have been derived by using escape cone concepts. Based on the design principles, some important high-brightness LED structures developed thus far have been reviewed and, in addition, their external coupling efficiencies have also been estimated. In AlGaAs or InGaAIP LEDs, in which photon absorption in the ohmic electrodes is known to be serious, photon shielding by the electrodes is minimized by using window layer (WL) as well as transparent substrate (TS) leading to significantly improved light-emitting efficiency. However, in InGaN LEDs emitting blue to green lights, the photon absorption in ohmic contact to wide bandgap GaN may be negligible and therefore, photon shielding by the electrodes would not lead to as significant problems as in conventional In AIGaAs or InGaAIP LEDs.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
• /
• v.2 no.3
• /
• pp.103-109
• /
• 2014

Highly efficient hydrogenated nanocrystalline silicon (nc-Si:H) thin-film solar cells were prepared on flexible stainless steel substrates using plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition. To enhance the performance of solar cells, material properties of back reflectors, n-doped seed layers and wide bandgap nc-SiC:H window layers were optimized. The light scattering efficiency of Ag back reflectors was improved by increasing the surface roughness of the films deposited at elevated substrate temperatures. Using the n-doped seed layers with high crystallinity, the initial crystal growth of intrinsic nc-Si:H absorber layers was improved, resulting in the elimination of the defect-dense amorphous regions at the n/i interfaces. The nc-SiC:H window layers with high bandgap over 2.2 eV were deposited under high hydrogen dilution conditions. The vertical current flow of the films was enhanced by the formation of Si nanocrystallites in the amorphous SiC:H matrix. Under optimized conditions, a high conversion efficiency of 9.13% ($V_{oc}=0.52$, $J_{sc}=25.45mA/cm^2$, FF = 0.69) was achieved for the flexible nc-Si:H thin-film solar cells.

• Journal of Electrical Engineering and information Science
• /
• v.2 no.5
• /
• pp.65-71
• /
• 1997

We present heterojunction solar cells with a structure of metal/a-Si:H(n-i-p)/poly-Si(n-p)/metal for the terrestrial applications. This cell consists fo two component cells: a top n-i-p junction a-Si:Hi cell with wide-bandgap 1.8eV and a bottom n-p junction poly-Si cell with narrow-bandgap 1.1eV. The efficiency influencing factors of the solar cell were investigated in terms of simulation an experiment. Three main topics of the investigated study were the bottom cell with n-p junction poly-Si, the top a-Si:H cell with n-i-p junction, and the interface layer effects of heterojunction cell. The efficiency of bottom cell was improved with a pretreatment temperature of 900$^{\circ}C$, surface polishing, emitter thickness of 0.43$\mu\textrm{m}$, top Yb metal, and grid finger shading of 7% coverage. The process optimized cell showed a conversion efficiency about 16%. Top cell was grown by suing a photo-CVD system which gave an ion damage free and good p/i-a-Si:H layer interface. The heterojunction interface effect was examined with three different surface states; a chemical passivation, thermal oxide passivation, and Yb metal. the oxide passivated cell exhibited the higher photocurrent generation and better spectral response.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
• /
• v.30 no.8
• /
• pp.525-529
• /
• 2017

Molybdenum oxide ($MoO_3$) offers pivotal advantages for high optical transparency and low light reflection. Considering device fabrication, n-type $MoO_3$ semiconductor can spontaneously establish a junction with p-type Si. Since the energy bandgap of Si is 1.12 eV, a maximum photon wavelength of around 1,100 nm is required to initiate effective photoelectric reaction. However, the utilization of infrared photons is very limited for Si photonics. Hence, to enhance the Si photoelectric devices, we applied the wide energy bandgap $MoO_3$ (3.7 eV) top-layer onto Si. Using a large-scale production method, a wafer-scale $MoO_3$ device was fabricated with a highly crystalline structure. The $MoO_3/p-Si$ heterojunction device provides distinct photoresponses for long wavelength photons at 900 nm and 1,100 nm with extremely fast response times: rise time of 65.69 ms and fall time of 71.82 ms. We demonstrate the high-performing $MoO_3/p-Si$ infrared photodetector and provide a design scheme for the extension of Si for the utilization of long-wavelength light.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
• /
• v.26 no.3
• /
• pp.198-203
• /
• 2013

Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) based on titanium dioxide ($TiO_2$) have been extensively studied because of their promising low-cost alternatives to conventional semiconductor based solar cells. DSSCs consist of molecular dye at the interface between a liquid electrolyte and a mesoporous wide-bandgap semiconductor oxide. Most efforts for high conversion efficiencies have focused on dye and liquid electrolytes. However, interface engineering between dye and electrode is also important to reduce recombination and improve efficiency. In this work, for interface engineering, we deposited semiconducting ferroelectric $BiFeO_3$ with bandgap of 2.8 eV on $TiO_2$ nanoparticles and nanotubes. Photovoltaic properties of DSSCs were characterized as a function of thickness of $BiFeO_3$. We showed that ferroelectric $BiFeO_3$-coated $TiO_2$ electrodes enable to increase overall efficiency of DSSCs, which was associated with efficient electron transport due to internal electric field originating from electric polarization. It was suggested that engineering the dye-$TiO_2$ interface using ferroelectric materials as inorganic modifiers can be key parameter for enhanced photovoltaic performance of the cell.

• Advances in nano research
• /
• v.15 no.5
• /
• pp.385-399
• /
• 2023

Hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), commonly referred to as Boron Nitride Nanoribbons (BNNRs), is an electrical insulator characterized by high thermal stability and a wide bandgap semiconductor property. This study delves into the electronic properties of two BNNR configurations: Armchair BNNRs (ABNNRs) and Zigzag BNNRs (ZBNNRs). Utilizing the nearest-neighbour tight-binding approach and numerical methods, the electronic properties of BNNRs were simulated. A simplifying assumption, the Hamiltonian matrix is used to compute the electronic properties by considering the self-interaction energy of a unit cell and the interaction energy between the unit cells. The edge perturbation is applied to the selected atoms of ABNNRs and ZBNNRs to simulate the electronic properties changes. This simulation work is done by generating a custom script using numerical computational methods in MATLAB software. When benchmarked against a reference study, our results aligned closely in terms of band structure and bandgap energy for ABNNRs. However, variations were observed in the peak values of the continuous curves for the local density of states. This discrepancy can be attributed to the use of numerical methods in our study, in contrast to the semi-analytical approach adopted in the reference work.

• Proceedings of the KIEE Conference
• /
• 1999.07d
• /
• pp.1523-1525
• /
• 1999

ZnO is a wide-bandgap II-VI semiconductor and has a variety of potential application. ZnO exhibits good piezoelectric, photoelectric and optic properties, and is good for a electroluminescence device. ZnO films have been deposited at (0001) shappire by PLD technique. Chamber was evacuated by turbomolecular pump to a base pressure of $1{\times}10^{-6}$ Torr Nd:YAG pulsed laser was operated at ${\lambda}=355nm$. The ZnO films were deposited at oxygen pressures from base to 500 mTorr. The substrate temperatures was increased from $200^{\circ}C$ to $700^{\circ}C$. At aleady works, UV emission and green-yellow PL was observed. In this work, ZnO films showed UV, violet, green and yellow emissions. UV emission was enhanced by increasing partial oxygen pressure. We investigated relationship between partial oxygen pressure and UV emission.