Ultra high-efficiency advanced triple-junction (ATJ) solar cell production at Emcore photovoltaics

Emcore Photovoltaics is in volume production of high-efficiency multijunction solar cells for spacecraft applications. Emcore's latest product is the advanced triple-junction (ATJ) InGaP/InGaAs/Ge solar cell. The ATJ cell exhibits a beginning-of-life (BOL) minimum average conversion efficiency of 27.5%, making it the highest efficiency flight cell available in the market to date. In this paper, the development and manufacturing aspects, as well as, space qualification results at the bare cell and coverglass-interconnected-cell (CIC) levels are presented.