Effect of front-surface-field and back-surface-field on the performance of GaAs based-photovoltaic cell

Abstract

GaAs structures are commonly used in concentrated solar cell application, whereas the active region of the cell requires front surface field (FSF) and back surface field (BSF) to complete the band diagram and to improve the conversion efficiency up to 22 % under AM 1.5 illumination condition. However, the integration of different FSF and BSF materials such as AlGaAs, InGaP and InAlP contribute to diverse performance. A fair comparison between these materials will help to optimize the performance of GaAs devices. In this work, Silvaco TCAD software was used to simulate GaAs PV cell with different FSF and BSF materials under 1-sun and 100-sun AM 1.5 illumination condition. A conversion efficiency of 24.08 % and 27.22 % was achieved with InAlP FSF layer under 1-sun and 100-sun AM 1.5 spectrum, respectively. The results obtained from this study will contribute to a better understanding on the effect of FSF and BSF layers while obtaining the optimum FSF and BSF material for the GaAs-based photovoltaic cell. © 2019 IEEE.