Fabrication of Nanowire Arrays over Micropyramids for efficient Si Solar Cell

To improve the efficiency of solar cell, trapping the sunlight and using it to its maximum limit has been the area of research for past several decades. In the present work, texturisation of silicon surface has been done to make nanowire arrays over micropyramids. Micropyramids on Si surface increases the surface area, reduce the reflectivity and hence help to enhance the solar cell performance. Additionally, with the aim to further reduce the reflectance of Si surface, nanowire arrays over micro pyramids were fabricated. For this, samples with variation in their nanotcxturisation time (etching time) were prepared. Measurements like SEM and UV-Vis reflectance spectroscopy were performed on the samples to investigate the changes with etching time. It was observed that the reflectance of planar Si in the spectral range 400 to 1000 nm is 35%. The reflectance of tnicrotextured (micropyramid) Si surface is significantly reduced to similar to 11%. A further decrease in reflectivity was observed when nanowire arrays were grown over the micropyramids. This may be attributed to the effective light trapping caused by multiple scattering of the incident light from the nanowires over micropyramids. Hence, it may improve silicon solar cell efficiency.