Numerical Study of Complementary Nanostructures for Light Trapping in Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells
"> Figure 1
<p>(<b>a</b>) The proposed process flow for fabrication of nanocavity and nanopillar arrays. (<b>b</b>) Top view scanning electron microscope (SEM) images and cross-sectional schematic of the nanocavity (left) and nanopillar (right) arrays fabricated using the proposed process.</p> "> Figure 2
<p>(<b>a</b>) Schematic of light diffraction in PbS quantum dot (QD) solar cell with patterned indium-doped tin oxide (ITO) electrode. (<b>b</b>) Optical constants of the materials used in the simulation model.</p> "> Figure 3
<p>The normalized transmission spectra of simulated patterned ITO structures: (<b>a</b>) nanocavity, (<b>b</b>) nanopillar. The plot shows the relative power transmitted into different diffracted orders and the net total transmitted power normalized to the simulation source power. Two of the strongest diffracted orders (1,1) and (2,0) are plotted. (0,0) represents the part of incident power not being diffracted by the structures.</p> "> Figure 4
<p>The light absorption spectra for PbS colloidal quantum dot (CQD) layer incorporated into different ITO structures normalized to (<b>a</b>) AM1.5G spectra and (<b>b</b>) simulation light source. The absorption enhancement for both cavity and pillar structures over the reference flat structure is obvious especially at resonance wavelengths of 950 nm for both structures and 1080 nm for cavity arrays. A slight absorption loss by ITO layer was also observed, as shown in <a href="#nanomaterials-06-00055-f004" class="html-fig">Figure 4</a>b.</p> "> Figure 5
<p>Simulated electric field distributions inside the PbS QDs layer with patterned structures. The hot spots present at resonance wavelengths (950 nm for both structures) with high field intensity indicate strong absorption inside PbS CQD. No hot spots are observed at off resonance wavelengths (1000 nm for both structures) suggesting the importance of resonant coupling of the incident into CQD layer for significant absorption enhancement.</p> ">
Abstract
:1. Introduction
2. Results and Discussion
2.1. Structure Design
2.2. Light Trapping Analysis
3. Materials and Methods
3.1. Complementary Structure Fabrication
3.2. Simulation Methods
4. Conclusions
Abbreviations
CQD | Colloidal Quantum Dot |
ITO | Indium-doped Tin Oxide |
NSL | Nano Sphere Lithography |
RIE | Reactive Ion Etching |
SEM | Scanning Electron Microscope |
PDMS | Polydimethylsiloxane |
FDTD | Finite Difference Time Domain |
Acknowledgments
Author Contributions
Conflicts of Interest
References
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Wei, J.; Xiong, Q.; Mahpeykar, S.M.; Wang, X. Numerical Study of Complementary Nanostructures for Light Trapping in Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells. Nanomaterials 2016, 6, 55. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano6040055
Wei J, Xiong Q, Mahpeykar SM, Wang X. Numerical Study of Complementary Nanostructures for Light Trapping in Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells. Nanomaterials. 2016; 6(4):55. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano6040055
Chicago/Turabian StyleWei, Jue, Qiuyang Xiong, Seyed Milad Mahpeykar, and Xihua Wang. 2016. "Numerical Study of Complementary Nanostructures for Light Trapping in Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells" Nanomaterials 6, no. 4: 55. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano6040055