Studying anomalous open-circuit voltage drop-out in concentrated photovoltaics using computational numerical analysis

Under ultra-high solar concentration, an anomalous open-circuit voltage drop-out has been observed experimentally, but not understood theoretically. This anomaly is often attributed to various thermal effects but is also observed in flash testing, where thermal effects do not have time to accumulate. As the optically generated carrier density increases past the equilibrium carrier density, open-circuit voltage and other important electrical properties could deteriorate. Using Newton linearizations and the finite-element library deal.II, we developed a computational model to solve the carrier continuity equations for optically generated charge carriers as a function of material depth in bulk III-V semiconductors.