Thin film silicon materials and solar cells grown by pulsed PECVD technique

Pulsed plasma enhanced chemical vapour deposition (PECVD) involves modulation of standard 13.56 MHz RF plasma in the kilohertz range. This allows an increase in the electron density during the ‘ON’ cycle, while in the ‘OFF’ cycle, neutralising the ions responsible for dust formation in the plasma. The authors report the development of state-of-the-art nanocrystalline Si (nc-Si:H) materials using a pulsed PECVD technique with 220 crystallite orientation, grain size of ∼200 Å, low O concentration and a minority carrier diffusion length Ld of ∼1.2 μm. The crucial effects of the p/i interface and the incubation layer have been investigated and an efficiency of ∼7.5% for a single junction nc-Si:H p-i-n device has been achieved for an i-layer thickness of 1.4 μm, using non-optimised textured substrates.