A MBE-grown high-efficiency GaAs solar cell with a directly deposited aluminum front contact

Author

Ragay, F.W. ; Leys, M.R. ; Nouwens, P.A.M. ; van der Vleuten, W.C. ; Wolter, J.H.

Author_Institution

Dept. of Phys., Eindhoven Univ. of Technol., Netherlands

Volume

13

Issue

12

fYear

1992

Firstpage

618

Lastpage

620

Abstract

A novel metallization scheme for GaAs p-n solar cells grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) is described. A p/sup +/-GaAs contact layer was grown on top of the AlGaAs window layer, followed by a pure aluminum layer. This MBE-grown aluminum layer serves both as metallization and as self-aligned mask for selective etching down to the AlGaAs window. The solar cell showed an efficiency of about 20%; the I-V characteristics revealed that negligible series resistance was present in the structure. To test the novel p-contact a second sample was grown. Using a transmission-line model (TLM) structure, a metal-semiconductor contact resistance of 1.5*10/sup -2/ Omega -cm/sup 2/ was found.<>

Keywords

III-V semiconductors; aluminium; contact resistance; gallium arsenide; metallisation; molecular beam epitaxial growth; semiconductor growth; semiconductor-metal boundaries; solar cells; 20 percent; Al-GaAs-Al/sub 0.8/Ga/sub 0.2/As-GaAs; AlGaAs window layer; I-V characteristics; high-efficiency; metal-semiconductor contact resistance; metallization scheme; molecular beam epitaxy; p-contact; p-n solar cells; selective etching; self-aligned mask; transmission-line model; Aluminum; Artificial intelligence; Epitaxial growth; Epitaxial layers; Etching; Gallium arsenide; Metallization; Molecular beam epitaxial growth; Photovoltaic cells; Temperature;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Electron Device Letters, IEEE

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0741-3106

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/55.192863

Filename

192863