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Tunnel junctions for multijunction solar cells

Patent ·
OSTI ID:1986929
Tunnel junctions for multijunction solar cells are provided. According to an aspect of the invention, a tunnel junction includes a first layer including p-type AlGaAs, a second layer including n-type GaAs, wherein the second layer is a quantum well, and a third layer including n-type AlGaAs or n-type lattice matched AlGaInP. The quantum well can be GaAs or AlxGaAs with x being more than about 40%, and lattice matched GaInAsNSb in the Eg range of from about 0.8 to about 1.4 eV.
Research Organization:
National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL), Golden, CO (United States); Univ. of California, Oakland, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
DOE Contract Number:
AC36-08GO28308
Assignee:
Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC (Golden, CO); The Regents of the University of California, A California Corporation (Oakland, CA)
Patent Number(s):
11,527,667
Application Number:
15/964,852
OSTI ID:
1986929
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

References (15)

Enhanced external radiative efficiency for 20.8% efficient single-junction GaInP solar cells journal July 2013
Double quantum-well tunnel junctions with high peak tunnel currents and low absorption for InP multi-junction solar cells journal May 2012
Enhanced Current Collection in 1.7 eV GaInAsP Solar Cells Grown on GaAs by Metalorganic Vapor Phase Epitaxy journal May 2017
Performance analysis of AlGaAs/GaAs tunnel junctions for ultra-high concentration photovoltaics journal January 2012
Development of High-Bandgap AlGaInP Solar Cells Grown by Organometallic Vapor-Phase Epitaxy journal May 2016
Growth of lattice-matched GaInAsP grown on vicinal GaAs(001) substrates within the miscibility gap for solar cells journal January 2017
Optical enhancement of the open-circuit voltage in high quality GaAs solar cells journal March 2013
Multijunction solar cell design revisited: disruption of current matching by atmospheric absorption bands: Disruption of current matching by atmospheric absorption bands
  • McMahon, William E.; Friedman, Daniel J.; Geisz, John F.
  • Progress in Photovoltaics: Research and Applications, Vol. 25, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1002/pip.2899
journal May 2017
Wafer bonded four-junction GaInP/GaAs//GaInAsP/GaInAs concentrator solar cells with 44.7% efficiency: Wafer bonded four-junction concentrator solar cells with 44.7% efficiency journal January 2014
Building a Six-Junction Inverted Metamorphic Concentrator Solar Cell journal March 2018
Design Flexibility of Ultrahigh Efficiency Four-Junction Inverted Metamorphic Solar Cells journal March 2016
Spectral binning for energy production calculations and multijunction solar cell design journal September 2017
High performance as-grown and annealed high band gap tunnel junctions: Te behavior at the interface journal May 2016
Highly Transparent Compositionally Graded Buffers for New Metamorphic Multijunction Solar Cell Designs journal January 2017
Generalized Optoelectronic Model of Series-Connected Multijunction Solar Cells journal November 2015

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