Coupled Charge and Radiation Transport Processes in Thermophotovoltaic and Thermoradiative Cells

Energy converters that recover thermal radiation have the potential for high-efficiency solid-state electricity generation. Modeling of these systems to date has made limiting assumptions that do not fully capture the nuances of charge and radiation interactions. To remedy this, the authors propose a fully coupled iterative model to properly account for photon and charge-carrier dynamics in both near-field and far-field thermophotovoltaic and thermoradiative systems. This approach can be used to better understand and design devices and materials that utilize thermal radiation.