2013 Fiscal Year Final Research Report
Study on photonic-crystal effects on photovoltaic materials towards efficient photovoltaic devices
Project/Area Number |
23686050
|
Research Category |
Grant-in-Aid for Young Scientists (A)
|
Allocation Type | Single-year Grants |
Research Field |
Electronic materials/Electric materials
|
Research Institution | Osaka University |
Principal Investigator |
|
Project Period (FY) |
2011-04-01 – 2014-03-31
|
Keywords | フォトニック結晶 / 光電変換材料 / 光電変換素子 / 光吸収 / 太陽電池 |
Research Abstract |
We demonstrate an enhancement of the optical absorption and photoelectric-conversion efficiency of an ultrathin (50 nm) silicon active-layer photodetecting device using a two-dimensional photonic crystal. We show both experimentally and with simulations that the incident-light absorption within the active layer is enhanced by optical-resonance effects at the photonic band edge. We also find that a photonic crystal with deeper holes can lead to an even larger absorption enhancement due to better Q-factor matching between the photonic band-edge modes and the intrinsic material absorption. The experimentally observed photocurrent of the fabricated photonic crystal sample is increased by a factor of around 20 at the photonic band-edge wavelength relative to that of a control sample without the photonic crystal which is attributed to the improved Q matching. We also investigate broadband optical absorption enhancement in thin silicon photovoltaic devices by photonic crystal.
|
Research Products
(21 results)