Indium phosphide based solar cell using ultra-thin ZnO as an electron selective layer

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According to the Shockley–Queisser limit, the maximum achievable efficiency for a single junction solar cell is ~33.2% which corresponds to a bandgap ( E g ) of 1.35 eV (InP). However, the maximum reported efficiency for InP solar cells remain at 24.2% ± 0.5%, that is >25% below the standard Shockley–Queisser limit. Through a wide range of simulations, we propose a new device structure, ITO/ ZnO/i-InP/p + InP (p-i-ZnO-ITO) which might be able to fill this efficiency gap. Our simulation shows that the use of a thin ZnO layer improves passivation of the underlying i-InP layer and provides electron selectivity leading to significantly higher efficiency when compared to their n + /i/p + homojunction counterpart. As a proof-of-concept, we fabricated ITO/ZnO/i-InP solar cell on a p + InP substrate and achieved an open-circuit voltage ( V oc ) and efficiency as high as 819 mV and 18.12%, respectively, along with ~90% internal quantum efficiency. The entire device fabrication process consists of four simple steps which are highly controllable and reproducible. This work lays the foundation for a new generation of thin film InP solar cells based solely on carrier selective heterojunctions without the requirement of extrinsic doping and can be particularly useful when p- and n-doping are challenging as in the case of III–V nanostructures.