Influence of dielectric coverage on photovoltaic conversion of silicon solar cells obtained by epitaxial lateral overgrowth

This work presents an analysis of the influence of SiO2 dielectric coverage of a Si substrate on the solar-cell efficiency of Si thin layers obtained by epitaxial lateral overgrowth (ELO). The layers were obtained by liquid phase epitaxy (LPE). All experiments were carried out under the following conditions: initial temperature of growth: 1193 K; temperature difference ^T = 60 K; ambient gas: Ar; metallic solvent: Sn+Al; cooling rates: 0.5 K/min and 1 K/min. To compare the influence of the interior reflectivity of photons, we used two types of dielectric masks in a shape of a grid etched in SiO2 along the <110> and <112> directions on a p+ boron-doped (111) silicon substrate, where silicon dioxide covered 70 % and 80 % of the silicon surface, respectively. The results obtained in this work depict the correlation between the interior efficiency and percentage of SiO2 coverage of the substrate of the ELO solar cells.