Researchers from Princeton and MIT have devised a method of adding several percentage points to the maximum output of a silicon solar cell beyond the current 35% limit to a potential 29.1% . They used a method that creates half electrons from each photon rather than the conventional one. That produces a doubling of the amount of energy produced by a given amount of sunlight in the blue and green part of the spectrum. The method had already been tried out using an organic photovoltaic cell but the researchers have now transferred the process to a silicon cell. The key to the development is an intermediate layer in the cell made from hafnium oxynitride. The researchers said more development work was needed.
Researchers from Princeton and MIT have devised a method of adding several percentage points to the maximum output of a silicon solar cell beyond the current 35% limit to a potential 29.1% . They used a method that creates half electrons from each photon rather than the conventional one. The method had already been tried out using an organic photovoltaic cell but the researchers have now transferred the process to a silicon cell. The key to the development is an intermediate layer in the cell made from hafnium oxynitride. The researchers said more development work was needed.