Journal article

Dip Coating Passivation of Crystalline Silicon by Lewis Acids

W Ji, Y Zhao, HM Fahad, J Bullock, T Allen, DH Lien, S De Wolf, A Javey

ACS Nano | AMER CHEMICAL SOC | Published : 2019

Abstract

The reduction of carrier recombination processes by surface passivation is vital for highly efficient crystalline silicon (c-Si) solar cells and bulk wafer metrological characterization. Herein, we report a dip coating passivation of silicon surfaces in ambient air and temperature with Nafion, achieving a champion effective carrier lifetime of 12 ms on high resistivity n-type c-Si, which is comparable to state-of-the-art passivation methods. Nafion is a nonreactive polymer with strong Lewis acidity, thus leading to the formation of a large density of fixed charges at silicon surface, 1-2 orders of magnitude higher than what is achievable with conventional thin-film passivation layers. Notabl..

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University of Melbourne Researchers

Grants

Awarded by U.S. Department of Energy


Funding Acknowledgements

We would like to thank Scott Bentrup of 3M Company for providing 3M PFSA powders for the passivation test. Passivation characterization and concept development were supported by the Electronic Materials Programs, funded by the Director, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Material Sciences and Engineering Division of the U.S. Department of Energy under Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. Device fabrication was funded by U.S. Department of Energy, Solar Energy Technologies Office under the Contract No. DE-EE0008162, and King Abdullah University of Science & Technology under the Contract No. OSR-2017-GRGG-3383.01.