18% efficient intrinsically passivated laser-processed silicon solar cells

It is demonstrated that single-crystal silicon solar cells with efficiencies greater than 18% AM1.5 can be fabricated by glow discharge implantation and pulsed excimer laser annealing. A unique characteristic of these cells is that the surfaces are passivated intrinsically to give open circuit voltages as high as 640 mV without high-temperature oxidation. The simplicity of the processing is emphasized and the prospects for raising the efficiencies to even higher values are discussed.