A method for fabricating an upright photovoltaic cell comprises growing one or more epitaxial layers on a substrate, thereby forming a diffused active junction on the substrate and one more additional active junctions above the diffused active junction. The method further comprises selectively etching an areal region of the one or more epitaxial layers, thereby forming a mesa on the substrate and exposing a substrate-contact region parallel to the areal region at a base of the mesa. The method further comprises depositing contact material onto the substrate-contact region, to form the first contact, and concertedly onto a mesa-contact region of the mesa, to form the second contact.

The present disclosure provides a double-sided passivated contact cell, where a front side and a rear side of the double-sided passivated contact cell each are provided with a tunnel layer, a doped polysilicon layer, and a passivation layer sequentially from an inside to an outside; and for the doped polysilicon layer at the front side and the doped polysilicon layer at the rear side, one of the doped polysilicon layer at the front side and the doped polysilicon layer at the rear side is a boron and carbon co-doped polysilicon layer, and the other of the doped polysilicon layer at the front side and the doped polysilicon layer at the rear side is a phosphorus and carbon co-doped polysilicon layer. The present disclosure further provides a preparation method of the double-sided passivated contact cell.

A solar cell and a solar laminate are described. The solar cell can have a front side which faces the sun during normal operation and a back side opposite front side. The solar cell can include conductive contacts having substantially reflective outer regions disposed on the back side of the solar cell. The solar laminate can include a first encapsulant, the first encapsulant disposed on the back side of the solar cell and a second encapsulant. The solar laminate can include the solar cell laminated between the first and second encapsulant. The substantially reflective outer regions of the conductive contacts and the first encapsulant can be configured to scatter and/or diffuse light at the back side of the solar laminate for substantial light collection at the back side of the solar cell. Methods of fabricating the solar cell are also described herein.

Provided is a solar cell comprising a photoelectric conversion unit on which textures are formed, and an electrode that includes a plurality of conductive particles. The average size of the textures is adjusted so that the diameter of an inscribed circle in a space surrounded by the ridgelines of a plurality of textures that are adjacent to each other in the textures and a virtual line that connects the vertices of the adjacent textures is smaller than the average particle size of the conductive particles.

An optical solar enhancer comprises a panel that has a top surface and a bottom surface and an imaginary central plane that extends between the top surface and the bottom surface. The panel includes a plurality of generally parallel features configured to variably increase radiant energy entering the top surface at an acute angle relative to the central plane such that the effect is strongest at lower angles (early morning and late day sun) and weakest at higher angles (mid-day sun) and then redirect the increased radiant energy through the bottom surface.

A first photodetector according to an embodiment of the present disclosure includes: a substrate having a first surface that serves as a light-receiving surface and a second surface opposed to the first surface, and including an uneven structure provided on the first surface and a light-receiving section that performs photoelectric conversion to generate electric charge corresponding to an amount of light reception for each pixel; a passivation film stacked on the first surface of the substrate; and a reflectance adjustment layer including a plurality of protrusions configuring the uneven structure and the passivation film embedded in a plurality of recesses configuring the uneven structure, and having a refractive index between the substrate and the passivation film.

A solar cell element includes: a transparent body; a Mg.sub.xAg.sub.1-x layer (0.001x0.045) having a thickness (2-13 nm); a ZnO layer having an arithmetical mean (Ra: 20-870 nm); and a transparent conductive layer. A photoelectric conversion layer including n-type and p-type layers further includes n-side and p-side electrodes. The ZnO layer is composed of ZnO columnar crystal grains grown on the Mg.sub.xAg.sub.1-x layer, and each ZnO grain has a longitudinal direction along a normal line of the body, has a width increasing from the Mg.sub.xAg.sub.1-x layer toward the transparent conductive layer, has a width which appears by cutting each ZnO grain along the normal line, and has a R2/R1 ratio (1.1-1.8). R1 represents the width of one end of the ZnO grain, and the one end is in contact with the surface of the Mg.sub.xAg.sub.1-x layer, and R2 represents the width of the other end of the ZnO grain.

A method for producing a solar cell, in particular a silicon thin-film solar cell, wherein a TCO layer (3) is applied to a glass substrate (1) and at least one silicon layer (4, 5) is applied to the TCO layer (3). Before the TCO layer (3) is applied, electron radiation is applied to the glass substrate (1), such that a light-scattering layer (2) of the glass substrate (1) is produced, to which light-scattering layer the TCO layer (3) is applied. Alternatively or additionally, a first silicon layer (4) may be applied to the TCO layer (3), a laser radiation or electron radiation may be applied to the first silicon layer (4), and a second silicon layer (5) may be applied to the irradiated first silicon layer (4).

A multilayer anti-reflection structure for a backside contact solar cell. The anti-reflection structure may be formed on a front side of the backside contact solar cell. The anti-reflection structure may include a passivation level, a high optical absorption layer over the passivation level, and a low optical absorption layer over the high optical absorption layer. The passivation level may include silicon dioxide thermally grown on a textured surface of the solar cell substrate, which may be an N-type silicon substrate. The high optical absorption layer may be configured to block at least 10% of UV radiation coming into the substrate. The high optical absorption layer may comprise high-k silicon nitride and the low optical absorption layer may comprise low-k silicon nitride.

Methods for fabricating busbar and finger metallization over TCO are disclosed. Rather than using expensive and relatively resistive silver paste, a high conductivity and relatively low cost copper is used. Methods for enabling the use of copper as busbar and fingers over a TCO are disclosed, providing good adhesion while preventing migration of the copper into the TCO. Also, provisions are made for easy soldering contacts to the copper busbars.