Si/SiGe hetero-junction solar cell with optimization design and theoretical analysis

Performances of solar cells, such as short circuit current density, open-circuit voltage, fill factor, and efficiency of solar cells on the multi-crystalline (mc)-SiGe on the Si with different Ge contents, are compared and investigated in this paper. The average Ge concentration was varied from 0% to ~ 20%. Appropriate addition of Ge in crystal Si is a very effective method to enhance the short circuit current density without degrading the open-circuit voltage owing to the modulation of the SiGe band-gap. The band-gap of the SiGe can be extracted by electron-hole plasma (EHP) model. With an optimization of Ge content and clean process condition, the overall efficiency of a Si/SiGe hetero-junction solar cell with Ge content of 8% is found to be ~ 16% and ~ 4% improvement achieved, as compared to the control multi-crystalline (mc)-Si solar cell. The theoretical simulations and analyses can help design the high efficiency Si/SiGe hetero-junction solar cell.