Metal Oxide Thin-Film Heterojunctions for Photovoltaic Applications.

Silicon-based tandem solar cells incorporating low-cost, abundant, and non-toxic metal oxide materials can increase the conversion efficiency of silicon solar cells beyond their conventional limitations with obvious economic and environmental benefits. In this work, the electrical characteristics of a metal oxide thin-film heterojunction solar cell based on a cuprous oxide (Cu₂O) absorber layer were investigated. Highly Al-doped n-type ZnO (AZO) and undoped p-type Cu₂O thin films were prepared on quartz substrates by magnetron sputter deposition.

Diffusivity of the double negatively charged mono-vacancy in silicon.

Lightly-doped silicon (Si) samples of n-type conductivity have been irradiated with 2.0 MeV [Formula: see text] ions at a temperature of 30 K and characterized in situ by deep level transient spectroscopy (DLTS) measurements using an on-line setup. Migration of the Si mono-vacancy in its double negative charge state (V ) starts to occur at temperatures above  ∼70 K and is monitored via trapping of V by interstitial oxygen impurity atoms ([Formula: see text]), leading to the growth of the prominent vacancy-oxygen ([Formula: see text]) center.