ABSTRACT
The past five years have seen significant cost reductions in photovoltaics and a correspondingly strong increase in uptake, with photovoltaics now positioned to provide one of the lowest-cost options for future electricity generation. What is becoming clear as the industry develops is that area-related costs, such as costs of encapsulation and field-installation, are increasingly important components of the total costs of photovoltaic electricity generation, with this trend expected to continue. Improved energy-conversion efficiency directly reduces such costs, with increased manufacturing volume likely to drive down the additional costs associated with implementing higher efficiencies. This suggests the industry will evolve beyond the standard single-junction solar cells that currently dominate commercial production, where energy-conversion efficiencies are fundamentally constrained by Shockley-Queisser limits to practical values below 30%. This Review assesses the overall prospects for a range of approaches that can potentially exceed these limits, based on ultimate efficiency prospects, material requirements and developmental outlook.
ABSTRACT
The effect of Sb spray time on the structure of InAs/GaAs quantum dot (QD) systems with Sb spray prior to the capping of a GaAs layer was determined by a Raman scattering study. The Raman spectra of the InAs/GaAs system show two phonon signal bands related to interface (IF) defects, located at the low-energy side of InAs QDs and GaAs cap layer main phonon peaks, respectively. The intensity ratio of the IF defect relative phonon signal to its corresponding main peak shows a significant decrease with the Sb spray time increasing from 0 to 15 s, but increases for spray times larger than 15 s. In addition, the InAs QD phonon peaks appear to be resolved with improved symmetry for 15 s of spray time. Finally, the GaAs transverse optical (TO) phonon peak is seen to vary with Sb spray time, both in terms of the intensity and the peak position, in a similar manner to the other results. Taken together, these results suggest the InAs/GaAs QDs with a 15-s Sb spray lead to a GaAs capping layer with less strain at the IF with the QDs and a lower density of crystalline defects. PACS: 81.05.Ea; 81.07.-b; 81.07.Ta.
ABSTRACT
The effect of Sb spray prior to the capping of a GaAs layer on the structure and properties of InAs/GaAs quantum dots (QDs) grown by molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) is studied by cross-sectional high-resolution transmission electron microscopy (HRTEM). Compared to the typical GaAs-capped InAs/GaAs QDs, Sb-sprayed QDs display a more uniform lens shape with a thickness of about 3 ~ 4 nm rather than the pyramidal shape of the non-Sb-sprayed QDs. Particularly, the dislocations were observed to be passivated in the InAs/GaAs interface region and even be suppressed to a large extent. There are almost no extended dislocations in the immediate vicinity of the QDs. This result is most likely related to the formation of graded GaAsSb immediately adjacent to the InAs QDs that provides strain relief for the dot/capping layer lattice mismatch. PACS: 81.05.Ea; 81.07.-b; 81.07.Ta.
