Impact Ionization Effects on the Efficiency of Quantum Dot Solar Cells

This paper indicates the energy conversion efficiency of a quantum dot multilayer solar cell considering impact ionization effect. A p-i-n InxGa1-xN/GaN quantum dot solar cell structure has been taken into account in the calculation. It is shown that the efficiency of a cell strongly depends on the impact ionization in stacked quantum dots at i-region of the cell. In our proposed structure it is demonstrated that, if averaged probability of impact ionization, P, varies from zero to one, maximum efficiency increases by more than 12% (from 43 percent in P=0 to 55 percent in P=1). Also it is demonstrated that by decreasing θ, maximum efficiency increases and reaches to its maximum, 59%, in θ=2.

Impact Ionization Effects on the Efficiency of Quantum Dot Solar Cells Keywords:

Quantum dot , intermediate band solar cells , impact ionization