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Influence of Hydrogen Plasma on the Defect Passivation of Polycrystalline Si Thin Film Solar Cells
Author(s) -
Gorka Benjamin,
Rau Björn,
Dogan Pinar,
Becker Christiane,
Ruske Florian,
Gall Stefan,
Rech Bernd
Publication year - 2009
Publication title -
plasma processes and polymers
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.644
H-Index - 74
eISSN - 1612-8869
pISSN - 1612-8850
DOI - 10.1002/ppap.200930202
Subject(s) - passivation , polycrystalline silicon , hydrogen , materials science , solar cell , open circuit voltage , plasma , analytical chemistry (journal) , crystallite , silicon , electrode , thin film , voltage , optoelectronics , chemistry , electrical engineering , metallurgy , nanotechnology , layer (electronics) , thin film transistor , physics , quantum mechanics , chromatography , organic chemistry , engineering
Hydrogen passivation (HP) of polycrystalline silicon (poly‐Si) thin film solar cells was performed in a parallel plate radio‐frequency (rf) plasma setup. The influence of hydrogen pressure p and electrode gap d on breakdown voltage V brk is presented showing that the minimum in V brk shifts with higher pressures towards higher p · d values. Cell test structures provided by CSG Solar AG were used to examine the influence of p and d on the open circuit voltage V OC . The highest V OC 's were achieved for p · d values that correspond to a minimum in V brk . HP strongly improved the V OC . After the hydrogen plasma treatment the V OC improved significantly by a factor of 2 and amounted to 450 mV. Optimized parameters were then applied to different poly‐Si solar cells prepared by electron beam evaporation.