LAUSR

This paper assesses the electrical performance of a metal-insulator-semiconductor (MIS) solar cell designed by using different high-k dielectrics. The study is aimed to achieve the optimized device geometrical dimensions while improving the quantum mechanical tunnelling mechanisms. In addition, an overall comparison between the proposed solar cell structures made of crystalline (c-Si) or hydrogenated amorphous (a-Si:H) silicon is presented. In particular, 10-Å-thick HfO 2 and Al 2 O 3 layers are used as alternative high-k materials to surmount the conventional SiO 2 drawbacks. Besides, in order to achieve the highest possible conversion efficiency ( n ), we have investigated the oxide physical and geometrical parameters effects on the fundamental cell figure of merits. The obtained results indicate that a MIS solar cell involving HfO 2 and a c-Si bulk, with cell thickness of 250 μm and an acceptor doping density of N A  = 7 × 10 15  cm −3 , perform the optimized results, namely J SC  = 45.06 mA/cm 2 , V OC  = 0.592 V, FF  = 81.95%, and η  = 21.85%.At the same time, for an a-Si:H-based thin structure with a cell thickness of 2 μm( N A  = 7 × 10 15  cm −3 ) we obtained J SC  = 16.3 mA/cm 2 , V OC  = 1.025 V, FF  = 78.8%,and η  = 13.1%.