Prediction of high efficiency ZnMgO/Si solar cells suppressing carrier recombination by conduction band engineering

Abstract

Abstract A significant conduction band offset appearing in n‐ZnO/p‐Si heterojunction solar cells is recognized as a serious roadblock to obtain high efficiency solar cells. By alloying with Mg, the conduction band in Zn 1– x Mg x O can be raised above that of Si, so that the influence of recombination centers at the interface between the two materials is strongly reduced, enabling high efficiency despite recombination velocities as high as 10 6 cm s −1 . By simulating these phenomena we predict an optimal design of a n‐Zn 0.8 Mg 0.2 O/p‐Si solar cell resulting in high conversion efficiencies.