Analysis of damage to silicon solar cells by high fluence electron irradiation

Author

Yamaguchi, Masafumi ; Taylor, Stephen J. ; Matsuda, Sumio ; Kawasaki, Osamu ; Ando, Koshi

Author_Institution

Toyota Technol. Inst., Nagoya, Japan

fYear

1996

fDate

13-17 May 1996

Firstpage

167

Lastpage

170

Abstract

Over a narrow interval of fluence of 1 MeV electron irradiation (from 1×10¹⁶ cm^-2 to 1×10¹⁷ cm^-2) incident upon n on p silicon space solar cells, we have observed an anomalous increase in I_SC, followed by an abrupt decrease and cell failure. Whereas usually the principal effect of irradiation on the output characteristics of solar cells is due to the degradation of the minority carrier diffusion length, in this case the removal of majority carriers due to the introduction of trap centres is seen to have a dominating influence

Keywords

electron beam effects; elemental semiconductors; photovoltaic power systems; semiconductor materials; short-circuit currents; silicon; solar cells; space vehicle power plants; Si; Si solar cells; cell failure; high fluence electron irradiation; majority carriers removal; n on p silicon space solar cells; radiation damage; short circuit current increase; trap centres; Belts; Degradation; Electron traps; Engines; Equations; Photovoltaic cells; Satellites; Silicon; Spontaneous emission; Testing;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, 1996., Conference Record of the Twenty Fifth IEEE

Conference_Location

Washington, DC

ISSN

0160-8371

Print_ISBN

0-7803-3166-4

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/PVSC.1996.563973

Filename

563973