Kaur, G.; Olivares, A.J.; Roca i Cabarrocas, P. Development of n-Type, Passivating Nanocrystalline Silicon Oxide Films via Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition. Solar2024, 4, 162-178.
Kaur, G.; Olivares, A.J.; Roca i Cabarrocas, P. Development of n-Type, Passivating Nanocrystalline Silicon Oxide Films via Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition. Solar 2024, 4, 162-178.
Kaur, G.; Olivares, A.J.; Roca i Cabarrocas, P. Development of n-Type, Passivating Nanocrystalline Silicon Oxide Films via Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition. Solar2024, 4, 162-178.
Kaur, G.; Olivares, A.J.; Roca i Cabarrocas, P. Development of n-Type, Passivating Nanocrystalline Silicon Oxide Films via Plasma-Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition. Solar 2024, 4, 162-178.
Abstract
Nanocrystalline silicon oxide (nc-SiOx:H) is a multipurpose material with its varied application in solar cells as a transparent front contact, intermediate reflector, back reflector layer and even tunnel layer for passivating contacts, owing to easy tailoring of its optical properties. In this work, we systematically investigate the influence of gas mixture (SiH4, CO2, PH3 and H2), RF power and process pressure on the optical, structural and passivation properties of thin n-type nc-SiOx:H films prepared in an industrial, high throughput, plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) reactor. We provide a detailed description of the n-type nc-SiOx:H material develop-ment using various characterization techniques (SEM, EDX, Raman spectroscopy, and spectro-scopic ellipsometry) with a focus on the relationship between the material properties and the pas-sivation they provide to n-type c-Si wafers characterized by their effective carrier lifetime (τeff). Further, we also outline the parameters to be kept in mind while developing different n-type nc-SiOx:H layers for different solar cell applications. We report a tunable optical gap (1.8 – 2.3 eV) for our n-type nc-SiOx:H films as well as excellent passivation properties with τeff up to 3.5 ms (iVoc ~ 715 mV) before annealing. Oxygen content plays an important role in determining the crystallinity and hence passivation quality of the deposited nanocrystalline silicon oxide films.
Engineering, Electrical and Electronic Engineering
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