Current enhanced photovoltaic device

US4379943A · kind A · utility

Assignee

• Energy Conversion Devices, Inc. · US

Inventors

• Chi C. Yang · Troy, US
• Arun Madan · Moraga, US
• Stanford R. Ovshinsky · Bloomfield Hills, US
• David Adler · Lexington, US

Key dates

• Filing date: Dec 14, 1981
• Grant date: Apr 12, 1983
• Expiry date: Dec 14, 2001

Classification

• Technology area (CPC Y): Emerging Cross-Sectional Technologies
• CPC primary: Y02P70/50

Abstract

The disclosure is directed to photovoltaic devices having enhanced short circuit currents and efficiencies. The devices are made by depositing on a previously deposited doped amorphous semiconductor alloy layer a body of intrinsic amorphous semiconductor alloys including a first intrinsic layer, adjacent the doped layer, formed from the deposition of a non-etching starting material and a second intrinsic layer different in composition from the first intrinsic layer. The second intrinsic layer preferably includes silicon and fluorine while the first intrinsic amorphous alloy layer does not include fluorine. The first intrinsic layer may be formed by the glow discharge decomposition of silane gas alone. The thicknesses of the first and second intrinsic layers are adjusted so as to match the respective potential drops thereof with the first intrinsic layer being relatively thin as compared to the second intrinsic layer.