Solar Cell Materials and Device Concepts

The growing importance of identifying renewable, clean energy sources has spurred increasing interest in photovoltaics. The viability of photovoltaics will depend on the solar cell cost, availability and hazards associated with solar cell materials/resources, and distributed overall cost of energy generation. The viability of photovoltaics may be improved with significant breakthroughs in solar cell efficiency, or through new methods to significantly reduce solar cell cost. We are currently investigating both new materials and device structures for high-efficiency, low-cost solar cells consisting of non-hazardous materials. Our current work includes the study of light-trapping in thin film solar cells to enhance conversion efficiency, and solar cells based on ZnO/ZnTe.

 

Optoelectronics Materials Research and Education

Jamie D. Phillips