Increasing the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of silicon solar cells by improving their junction properties or minimizing light reflection losses remains a major challenge. Extensive studies were carried out in order to develop an effective antireflection coating for monocrystalline solar cells. Here we report on the preparation of a nanostructured cerium oxide thin film by pulsed laser deposition (PLD) as an antireflection coating for silicon solar cell. The structural, optical, and electrical properties of a cerium oxide nanostructure film are investigated as a function of the number of laser pulses. The X-ray diffraction results reveal that the deposited cerium oxide films are crystalline in nature and have a cubic fluorite. The field emission scanning electron microscope investigations show an increase in the film grain size with increasing the number of laser pulses. The carrier concentration of the film decreases and the mobility increases as the number of laser pulses increases. The cerium oxide film deposited on silicon at 900 laser pulses exhibits a minimum optical reflection. The maximum PCE was 19.27% and fill factor of 87% was obtained after the deposition of silicon solar cell with cerium oxide nanostructured film deposited at 1000 laser pulses.
Structural and optical properties of CdO and CdO0.99Cu0.01 thin
films were prepared in this work. Cadmium Oxide (CdO) and
CdO0.99Cu0.01semiconducting films are deposited on glass substrates
by using pulsed laser deposition method (PLD) using SHG with Qswitched
Nd:YAG pulsed laser operation at 1064nm in 6x10-2 mbar
vacuum condition and frequency 6 Hz. CdO and CdO0.99Cu0.01 thin
films annealed at 550 C̊ for 12 min. The crystalline structure was
studied by X-ray diffraction (XRD) method and atomic force
microscope (AFM). It shows that the films are polycrystalline.
Optical properties of thin films were analyzed. The direct band gap
energy of CdO and CdO0.99Cu0.01 thin films were determined from
(αhυ)1/2 v
Beryllium Zinc Oxide (BexZn1-xO) ternary nano thin films were deposited using the pulsed laser deposition (PLD) technique under a vacuum condition of 10-3 torr at room temperature on glass substrates with different films thicknesses, (300, 600 and 900 nm). UV-Vis spectra study found the optical band gap for Be0.2Zn0.8O to be (3.42, 3.51 and 3.65 eV) for the (300, 600 and 900nm) film thicknesses, respectively which is larger than the value of zinc oxide ZnO (3.36eV) and smaller than that of beryllium oxide BeO (10.6eV). While the X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern analysis of ZnO, BeO and Be 0.2 Zn 0.8 O powder and nano-thin films indicated a hexa
... Show MoreIn this study, investigations of structural properties of n-type porous silicon prepared by laser assisted-electrochemical etching were demonstrated. The Photo- electrochemical Etching technique, (PEC) was used to produce porous silicon for n-type with orientation of (111). X-ray diffraction studies showed distinct variations between the fresh silicon surface and the synthesized porous silicon surfaces. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) analysis was used to study the morphology of porous silicon layer. AFM results showed that root mean square (RMS) of roughness and the grain size of porous silicon decreased as etching current density increased. The chemical bonding and structure were investigated by using fourier transformation infrared spec
... Show MorePolycrystalline Cadmium Oxide (CdO) thin films were prepared using pulsed laser deposition onto glass substrates at room temperature with different thicknesses of (300, 350 and 400)nm, these films were irradiated with cesium-137(Cs-137) radiation. The thickness and irradiation effects on structural and optical properties were studied. It is observed by XRD results that films are polycrystalline before and after irradiation, with cubic structure and show preferential growth along (111) and (200) directions. The crystallite sizes increases with increasing of thickness, and decreases with gamma radiation, which are found to be within the range (23.84-4.52) nm and (41.44-4.974)nm before and after irradiation for thickness 350nm and 4
... Show MorePolycrystalline Cadmium Oxide (CdO) thin films were prepared
using pulsed laser deposition onto glass substrates at room
temperature with different thicknesses of (300, 350 and 400)nm,
these films were irradiated with cesium-137(Cs-137) radiation. The
thickness and irradiation effects on structural and optical properties
were studied. It is observed by XRD results that films are
polycrystalline before and after irradiation, with cubic structure and
show preferential growth along (111) and (200) directions. The
crystallite sizes increases with increasing of thickness, and decreases
with gamma radiation, which are found to be within the range
(23.84-4.52) nm and (41.44-4.974)nm before and after irradiation for
Zinc Oxide (ZnO) thin films of different thickness were prepared
on ultrasonically cleaned corning glass substrate, by pulsed laser
deposition technique (PLD) at room temperature. Since most
application of ZnO thin film are certainly related to its optical
properties, so the optical properties of ZnO thin film in the
wavelength range (300-1100) nm were studied, it was observed that
all ZnO films have high transmittance (˃ 80 %) in the wavelength
region (400-1100) nm and it increase as the film thickness increase,
using the optical transmittance to calculate optical energy gap (Eg
opt)
show that (Eg
opt) of a direct allowed transition and its value nearly
constant (~ 3.2 eV) for all film thickness (150
In this study, doped thin cadmium peroxide films were prepared by pulsed laser deposition with different doping concentrations of aluminium of 0.0, 0.1, 0.3, and 0.5 wt.% for CdO2(1-X)Al(X) and thicknesses in the range of 200 nm. XRD patterns suggest the presence of cubic CdO2 and the texture factor confirms that the (111) plane was the preferential growth plane, where the texture factor and the grain size decreased from 2.02 to 9.75 nm, respectively, in the pure sample to 1.88 and 5.65 nm, respectively, at a concentration of 0.5 wt%. For the predominant growth plane, the deviation of the diffraction angle Δθ and interplanar distance Δd from the standard magnitudes was 2.774° and 0.318 Å, respectively, for the pure sample decreased to
... Show MoreThe Cu2SiO3 composite has been prepared from the binary compounds (Cu2O, and SiO2) with high purity by solid state reaction. The Cu2SiO3 thin films were deposited at room temperature on glass and Si substrates with thickness 400 nm by pulsed laser deposition method. X-ray analysis showed that the powder of Cu2SiO3 has a polycrystalline structure with monoclinic phase and preferred orientation along (111) direction at 2θ around 38.670o which related to CuO phase. While as deposited and annealed Cu2SiO3 films have amorphous structure. The morphological study revealed that the grains have granular and elliptical shape, with average diameter of 163.63 nm. The electrical properties which represent Hall effect were investigated. Hall coeffici
... Show MoreAbstract: The development of highly sensitive sensors has become an efficient field of research. In this work, an ArF Excimer laser of 193 nm with a maximum pulse energy of 275 mJ, 15 ns pulse duration and a repetition rate of 1 Hz is utilized to form a Laser Induced Periodic Surface Structures (LIPSS) of three different morphologies (nanochains, contours, grooves) on surface of CR39 polymer at a fluence range above the ablation threshold (250 mJ/cm2). The laser ablated polymer surface is then Surface Enhanced Raman Scattering (SERS) activated by deposition of a gold layer of 30 nm thickness. The capability of the produced substrate for surface enhanced Raman scattering is evaluated through thiophenol as an analyte molecule. It is observ
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