Absorption enhancement in solar cells by localized plasmon polaritons

Rockstuhl, Carsten; Fahr, Stephan; Lederer, Falk

doi:doi:10.1063/1.3037239

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Tunable lateral shift and polarization beam splitting of the transmitted light beam through electro-optic crystals

We have investigated the tunable lateral shift and polarization beam splitting of the transmitted light beam through electro-optic crystals, based on the Pockels effect. The positive and negative lateral shifts could be easily controlled by adjusting the permittivity tensor, which is modulated by the external applied electric field. An alternative way to realize the polarization beam splitter was also proposed by the polarization-dependent lateral shifts. Numerical simulations for Gaussian-shap...

Electrically injected InGaAs/GaAs photonic crystal membrane light emitting microcavity with spatially localized gain

Electrically injected photonic crystal membrane light emitting microcavities with spatially localized optical gain are reported. The localization of the InGaAs quantum well inside the defect cavity of the photonic crystal allows for efficient coupling of the optical mode to the gain medium and reduces nonradiative carrier recombination. The use of a buried oxide layer under the semiconductor membrane enables optical and electrical confinement and a submicron diameter oxide aperture provides a c...

By means of a rigorous diffraction theory, we investigate the possibility to enhance the absorption in solar cells by employing localized plasmon polaritons excited in metallic nanowires. The solar cells are assumed to be made of amorphous silicon. We identify two reasons for increased absorption; namely, the giant near-field enhancement and the enhanced scattering cross section upon exciting localized plasmon polaritons. It will be shown that by a careful and rational adjustment of the system parameters an enhancement in the number of absorbed photons from the solar spectrum up to a factor of 1.6 is feasible.

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INTRODUCTION
METHODS
RESULTS
CONCLUSION

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KEYWORDS and PACS

Keywords

elemental semiconductors, nanowires, plasmons, polaritons, silicon, silver, solar cells

PACS

84.60.Jt

Photoelectric conversion
73.22.Lp

Collective excitations
71.36.+c

Polaritons (including photon-phonon and photon-magnon interactions)

ARTICLE DATA

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http://link.aip.org/link/doi/10.1063/1.3037239

PUBLICATION DATA

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0021-8979 (print)

1089-7550 (online)

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American Institute of Physics

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