Materials 2014, 7(2), 948-962; doi:10.3390/ma7020948
Role of SiNx Barrier Layer on the Performances of Polyimide Ga2O3-doped ZnO p-i-n Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon Thin Film Solar Cells
1
Department of Electrical Engineering, and Graduate Institute of Optoelectronic Engineering, National Chung Hsing University, Taichung 40227, Taiwan
2
Department of Electrical Engineering, National University of Kaohsiung, Kaohsiung 81148, Taiwan
3
Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, National University of Kaohsiung, Kaohsiung 81148, Taiwan
*
Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Received: 30 September 2013 / Revised: 2 January 2014 / Accepted: 20 January 2014 / Published: 7 February 2014
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Solar Energy Materials 2013)
Abstract
In this study, silicon nitride (SiNx) thin films were deposited on polyimide (PI) substrates as barrier layers by a plasma enhanced chemical vapor deposition (PECVD) system. The gallium-doped zinc oxide (GZO) thin films were deposited on PI and SiNx/PI substrates at room temperature (RT), 100 and 200 °C by radio frequency (RF) magnetron sputtering. The thicknesses of the GZO and SiNx thin films were controlled at around 160 ± 12 nm and 150 ± 10 nm, respectively. The optimal deposition parameters for the SiNx thin films were a working pressure of 800 × 10−3 Torr, a deposition power of 20 W, a deposition temperature of 200 °C, and gas flowing rates of SiH4 = 20 sccm and NH3 = 210 sccm, respectively. For the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI structures we had found that the GZO thin films deposited at 100 and 200 °C had higher crystallinity, higher electron mobility, larger carrier concentration, smaller resistivity, and higher optical transmittance ratio. For that, the GZO thin films deposited at 100 and 200 °C on PI and SiNx/PI substrates with thickness of ~1000 nm were used to fabricate p-i-n hydrogenated amorphous silicon (α-Si) thin film solar cells. 0.5% HCl solution was used to etch the surfaces of the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI substrates. Finally, PECVD system was used to deposit α-Si thin film onto the etched surfaces of the GZO/PI and GZO-SiNx/PI substrates to fabricate α-Si thin film solar cells, and the solar cells’ properties were also investigated. We had found that substrates to get the optimally solar cells’ efficiency were 200 °C-deposited GZO-SiNx/PI.Keywords:
silicon nitride (SiNx); polyimide (PI); PECVD; GZO thin film; silicon thin film solar cell
This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY 3.0).
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Wang, F.-H.; Kuo, H.-H.; Yang, C.-F.; Liu, M.-C. Role of SiNx Barrier Layer on the Performances of Polyimide Ga2O3-doped ZnO p-i-n Hydrogenated Amorphous Silicon Thin Film Solar Cells. Materials 2014, 7, 948-962.
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