Bandgap Engineering of Multi-Junction Solar Cells for Enhanced Performance Under Concentration

Abstract

This doctorate thesis focuses on investigating the parameter space involved in numerically modeling the bandgap engineering of a GaInP/InGaAs/Ge lattice matched multi-junction solar cell (MJSC) using InAs/InGaAs quantum dots (QDs) in the middle sub-cell. The simulation environment – TCAD Sentaurus – solves the semiconductor equations using finite element and finite difference methods throughout well-defined meshes in the device to simulate the optoelectronic behavior first for single junction solar cells and subsequently for MJSCs with and without quantum dots under concentrated illumination of up to 1000 suns’ equivalent intensity. The MJSC device models include appropriate quantum tunneling effects arising in the tunnel junctions which serve as transparent sub-cell interconnects. These tunneling models are calibrated to measurements of AlGaAs/GaAs and AlGaAs/AlGaAs tunnel junctions reaching tunneling peak current densities above 1000 A/cm^2. Self-assembled InAs/GaAs quantum dots (QDs) are treated as an effective medium through a description of appropriate generation and recombination processes. The former includes analytical expressions for the absorption coefficient that amalgamates the contributions from the quantum dot, the InAs wetting layer (WL) and the bulk states. The latter includes radiative and non-radiative lifetimes with carrier capture and escape considerations from the confinement potentials of the QDs. The simulated external quantum efficiency was calibrated to a commercial device from Cyrium Technologies Inc., and required 130 layers of the QD effective medium to match the contribution from the QD ground state. The current – voltage simulations under standard testing conditions (1 kW/cm^2, T=298 K) demonstrated an efficiency of 29.1%, an absolute drop of 1.5% over a control structure. Although a 5% relative increase in photocurrent was observed, a 5% relative drop in open circuit voltage and an absolute drop of 3.4% in fill factor resulted from integrating lower bandgap nanostructures with shorter minority carrier lifetimes. However, these results are considered a worst case scenario since maximum capture and minimum escape rates are assumed for the effective medium model. Decreasing the band offsets demonstrated an absolute boost in efficiency of 0.5% over a control structure, thus outlining the potential benefits of using nanostructures in bandgap engineering MJSCs.