Volume 8, Issue 1, September 2014, Pages 107–113
Rishabh Monga1, Sudhir Kumar Gupta2, and R. Pratibha Nalini3
1 School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, Bachelor of Technology, Vellore Institute of Technology, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
2 Student, Bachelors of Technology, School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Chennai, India
3 Assistant Professor, School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Chennai, India
Original language: English
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
In today's predominant silicon based technology, a lot of research is carried out in using various silicon based matrices especially for new, efficient and reduced cost solar cells. This has led to a deep research into third generation silicon based thin film solar cells that consist of nanostructures. In this respect, a variety of silicon based host matrices have been investigated for solar cell applications including silicon dioxide and silicon nitride. Recently, interest has been extended to silicon carbide (SiC) because of its lower band gap (2.5 eV) as compared to SiO2 (9eV) and Si3N4 (5.3eV), in order to favor better electrical conductivity. This paper reports the initial works carried out on silicon carbide based thin films, where in, optical and structural properties of the film were investigated. These results would be useful in carrying out further research on the fabrication of Si nanostructures in SiC based matrix which is a challenge in today's research scenario.
Author Keywords: Silicon carbide, Magnetron sputtering, XRD, XRR, profilometry, FT-IR spectroscopy, ellipsometry, AFM, DRS.
Rishabh Monga1, Sudhir Kumar Gupta2, and R. Pratibha Nalini3
1 School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, Bachelor of Technology, Vellore Institute of Technology, Chennai, Tamil Nadu, India
2 Student, Bachelors of Technology, School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Chennai, India
3 Assistant Professor, School of Mechanical and Building Sciences, VIT University, Chennai, India
Original language: English
Copyright © 2014 ISSR Journals. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
Abstract
In today's predominant silicon based technology, a lot of research is carried out in using various silicon based matrices especially for new, efficient and reduced cost solar cells. This has led to a deep research into third generation silicon based thin film solar cells that consist of nanostructures. In this respect, a variety of silicon based host matrices have been investigated for solar cell applications including silicon dioxide and silicon nitride. Recently, interest has been extended to silicon carbide (SiC) because of its lower band gap (2.5 eV) as compared to SiO2 (9eV) and Si3N4 (5.3eV), in order to favor better electrical conductivity. This paper reports the initial works carried out on silicon carbide based thin films, where in, optical and structural properties of the film were investigated. These results would be useful in carrying out further research on the fabrication of Si nanostructures in SiC based matrix which is a challenge in today's research scenario.
Author Keywords: Silicon carbide, Magnetron sputtering, XRD, XRR, profilometry, FT-IR spectroscopy, ellipsometry, AFM, DRS.
How to Cite this Article
Rishabh Monga, Sudhir Kumar Gupta, and R. Pratibha Nalini, “Investigation of Silicon carbide based thin films for Solar cell applications,” International Journal of Innovation and Applied Studies, vol. 8, no. 1, pp. 107–113, September 2014.