Imaging photocurrent collection losses in solar cells

A method is proposed that enables the imaging of thephotocurrent collected by a solar cell under arbitrary operating conditions. The method uses a series of luminescence images under varyingillumination to derive the totalphotocurrent collection efficiency at a given voltage bias. The resulting totalphotocurrent collection image directly relates to the difference between the dark and illuminated current-voltagecharacteristics of the cell. A crystallinesilicon solar cell is used to test the method, and the images of the totalphotocurrent collection efficiency are used to quantify the influence of a crack on the total collectedphotocurrent of the solar cell.

Source: Applied Physics Letters - December 1, 2016 Category: Physics Authors: Vito Huhn, Bart E. Pieters, Yael Augarten, Andreas Gerber, David Hinken and Uwe Rau Source Type: research