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Impact of Amorphous and Crystalline Tungsten Trioxide (WO3) Thin Films as an Antireflection Material for Silicon (c-Si) Solar Cells

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Abstract

The effects of single-layer antireflection coatings (SLARCs) on the performance of crystalline silicon (c-Si)-based solar cells have been analyzed numerically. In this study, amorphous (a-WO3) and crystalline (c-WO3) tungsten trioxide was introduced as a SLARC to investigate the performance of photovoltaic cells. Different antireflection coating (ARC) materials including aluminum trioxide (Al2O3), magnesium fluoride (MgF2), titanium dioxide (TiO2), magnesium oxide (MgO), silicon carbide (SiC), silicon dioxide (SiO2), aluminum-doped zinc oxide (AZO), strontium fluoride (SrF2), and titanium nitride (TiN) were used for simulative comparative analysis with WO3 in the search for the highest efficiency of c-Si solar cells. The PC1D simulator was employed to investigate the impact of these ARC materials on device performance. When compared to other ARC materials, the highest efficiency (η) of 19.35% was achieved for a-WO3 thin film with a thickness of 70.7 nm. The a-WO3 ARC layer yielded an open-circuit voltage (Voc) of 0.6363 V, short-circuit current density (Jsc) of 36.86 mA/cm2, and short-circuit current (Isc) of 3.686 A. The Jsc values obtained are in close agreement with the ARC layers' reflectance values. It is important to recognize that the main factors established in this simulation study about SLARC production will make experimental data cheaper and faster.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by the Higher Education Commission (HEC) of Pakistan [Grant No. 8615/Punjab/NRPU/R&D/HEC/2017] to Dr. Khuram Ali.

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  1. Nano-Optoelectronics Research Laboratory, Department of Physics, University of Agriculture Faisalabad, Faisalabad, 38040, Pakistan

    Sameen Maqsood, Khuram Ali & Zohaib Ali

  2. Department of Vision Sciences, University of Lahore, Lahore, Pakistan

    Iqra Iqbal

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Maqsood, S., Ali, K., Ali, Z. et al. Impact of Amorphous and Crystalline Tungsten Trioxide (WO3) Thin Films as an Antireflection Material for Silicon (c-Si) Solar Cells. J. Electron. Mater. 52, 165–176 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11664-022-09939-3

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