Light-trapping by wave interference in intermediate-thickness silicon solar cells

The power conversion efficiency of crystalline silicon (c - Si) solar cells have witnessed a 2.1% increase over the last 25 years due to improved carrier transport. Recently, the conversion efficiency of c - Si cell has reached 27.1% but falls well below the Shockley-Queisser limit as well as the statistical ray-optics based 29.43% limit. Further improvement of conversion efficiency requires reconsideration of traditional ray-trapping strategies for sunlight absorption. Wave-interference based light-trapping in photonic crystals (PhC) provides the opportunity to break the ray-optics based 4n