Scientific publications

Find all of BURST Scientific publications here and on the project’s Zenodo repository for Open Access publications.

Optimization of Photolithographic Fabrication of Photonic Crystals and their Use in High Efficiency Solar Cells

Developed an optimized process for making inverted pyramid photonic crystals (PCs) on silicon substrates to improve light trapping in solar cells.
Achieved very narrow ridge widths (down to 150 ± 50 nm) and high yield across multiple wafer areas.
Antireflection coatings were optimized, resulting in low reflection similar to random pyramid reference samples.
The new structure provided a path length enhancement of 25 at 1200 nm wavelength—comparable to, but not better than, random pyramids and still below the theoretical maximum.
First demonstration of POLO2-IBC solar cells with these photonic crystals on the front, reaching a power conversion efficiency of 22.9%.

Key aspects of Carrier-Selective Contacts: work function, energy barriers, and energy alignment across the stack of layers.
Advanced CSC Designs: Evaluation of various CSC types for c-Si solar cells and the introduction of novel CSC structures.
High-Efficiency FBC and IBC Designs: Simulated efficiencies up to 28% in FBC and above 28% in IBC solar cells.
Technological barriers to achieving theoretical efficiency limits include the challenge of precise small-scale patterning.