High-Efficiency, Silicon Germanium Quantum Well Solar Cell
Researchers at NASA Langley Research Center are developing silicon germanium quantum well solar cells. These solar cells would have applications for NASA as well as commercial markets. Unlike conventional silicon solar cells, the new technology is built on a sapphire substrate so it can be lit from the backside. For NASA, a more efficient solar cell would mean less weight, and would take up less volume for spacecraft and any other power applications. That feature also translates into many smaller marketable devices that now have silicon solar cell power requirements.
More From SAE Media Group
Tech Briefs
Turning Thermal Energy into Electricity
Tech Briefs
Enhanced Material Stable Enough for Solar Cells
Power Management INSIDER
Precision Spray Coating Makes Better Perovskite Solar Cells
Tech Briefs
Stable Polymeric Ink with High Conductivity
Power Electronics INSIDER
Ultrathin Solar Cells Get a Boost
Tech Briefs
Turning Diamond into Metal
Power Management INSIDER
Advanced Solar Panels Extract More Energy from Sunlight
Tech Briefs
Products of Tomorrow
Tech Briefs
Generating Electrical Power from Waste Heat
Green Design & Manufacturing
Inkjet Deposition of Etchant and Dopant Materials
Green Design & Manufacturing
Highly Absorbing, Flexible Solar Cells Created With Silicon Wire Arrays
Electronics & Sensors INSIDER
Researchers Create First Functional Semiconductor Made from Graphene
Electronics & Sensors INSIDER
Growing a 2D Functional Transistor on a Silicon Wafer
Electronics & Sensors INSIDER
Researchers Wire Up Individual Graphene Nanoribbons
Power Management INSIDER
Boron Nitride Separation Process Could Facilitate Higher Efficiency Solar Cells
Power Electronics INSIDER
Improved GaN-Based Semiconductor Devices for Power Electronics
Electronics & Sensors INSIDER
New Material Will Make Locally Flexible Diodes Possible
Electronics & Sensors INSIDER
2D Materials for Extra Thin Computer Chips
Tech Briefs
Flexible Organic Photovoltaics
Transcript
00:00:02 [Music] The silicon germanium quantum well solar cell is a combination of different technologies, one based on our silicon germanium technology and the other is based on the quantum well and both of these increase the efficiency of the solar cell. The highest efficiency in a solar cell is when you have a single crystalline material and this is unique because this single crystalline silicon germanium, so you have higher mobility because the germanium has three times the mobility of silicon and also because you have a quantum well. When you have a quantum well, you confine the electrons to one plane and the only way that you can create a quantum well is to precisely control the layer thicknesses when you build up your solar cell. And this is something that we can do in our lab. Another thing that makes
00:01:09 this unique is that it's built on the sapphire substrate, so you can actually light it from the back side. Unlike conventional silicon solar cell, the light isn’t lost by the conductive layer. That means higher efficiency. NASA would use that on spacecraft or any power application because if you have a more efficient solar cell that means you need less of them and so you have less weight and it takes up less volume. The commercial sector would also benefit because you can have smaller devices that have the same power requirements as a silicon solar cell but the solar cell would be much smaller. We knew something like this could replace that because it's a whole different structure; it's a whole different way of looking at it. And so the silicon germanium technology has resulted in six patents so far and it and numerous different applications, so some of our other Research efforts are also based
00:02:15 on that technology