The utilization of microcrystalline Si and SiC for the efficiency improvement in a-Si solar cells

A systematic investigations on the modification of interface potential by introducing doped microcrystalline Si (/spl mu/c-Si) and it's carbon alloys (/spl mu/c-SiC) at the TCO/p a-SiC interface has been made. It has been shown that a remarkable increase of the built-in potential with insertion of these materials. A series of technical data on the improvement of photovoltaic characteristics achieved by employing the microcrystalline materials are presented. The mechanism of improvements is discussed on the basis of systematic diagnostics on the interface properties.