A stacked III-V multi-junction solar cell with a top and a bottom. A metallic top contact area is formed at the top and has a first layer of metal, a flat metallic bottom contact area formed on the bottom. An opening extends continuously from the top to the bottom and has an upper edge area formed at the top and a lower edge area formed at the bottom. The upper edge area is adjacent to the top contact area and the side wall and the two edge areas are covered with a dielectric layer. The dielectric layer has a top and a bottom. A first metallic top layer is formed on a surface of the first metal layer and on the top of the dielectric layer and a second metallic top layer is formed on a part of the first metal layer adjacent to the upper edge area.

In one aspect, optoelectronic devices are described herein. In some implementations, an optoelectronic device comprises a photovoltaic cell. The photovoltaic cell comprises a space-charge region, a quasi-neutral region, and a low bandgap absorber region (LBAR) layer or an improved transport (IT) layer at least partially positioned in the quasi-neutral region of the cell.

A multijunction solar cell including an upper first solar subcell having an emitter and base layers forming a photoelectric junction; a second solar subcell disposed under and adjacent to the upper first solar subcell, and having an emitter and base layers forming a photoelectric junction; and a third solar subcell disposed under and adjacent to the second solar subcell and having an emitter and base layers forming a photoelectric junction; wherein at least one of the base and emitter layers of at least a particular solar subcell from among the upper first solar subcell, the second solar subcell, and the third solar subcell has a graded band gap throughout at least a portion of thickness of its active layer adjacent to the photoelectric junction and being in a range of 20 to 300 MeV less than a band gap in the active layer in both the emitter layer and the base layer spaced away from the photoelectric junction.

The HCPV system includes a plurality of modules connected to an array, a casing, a plurality of inverted pyramids, a plurality of solar cells, and a backplate. Each module includes an optical component that concentrates light onto a single solar cell and a single inverted pyramid with solid lateral faces connects the optical component at a peripheral edge of a base of the pyramid to the single solar cell at an apex of the inverted pyramid. The casing has a top frame and a bottom frame. The top frame surrounds each optical component on the peripheral edge of the pyramid, and the bottom frame surrounds each solar cell on the apex of the pyramid. The top frame and bottom frame are separated by a plurality of supports. The backplate is a plurality of interconnected circular pads.

The disclosure relates to a device and method for testing a concentrated photovoltaic module comprising a plurality of sub-modules, which comprises: light sources; and parabolic mirrors coupled with the light sources so as to reflect the light from each source in quasi-collimated light beams toward the module to be tested, perpendicular to the module. Each light source comprises: an optical system comprising two parallel lenses on either side of a diaphragm; a lamp on an optical axis of the optical system; a reflector arranged on the axis, on the side opposite the optical system relative to the lamp, and translatably movable along the axis; and a housing containing the optical system, the lamp and the reflector and including an outlet opening for the light beam on the axis.

An energy conversion device comprises at least two thin film photovoltaic cells fabricated separately and joined by wafer bonding. The cells are arranged in a hierarchical stack of decreasing order of their energy bandgap from top to bottom. Each of the thin film cells has a thickness in the range from about 0.5 m to about 10 m. The photovoltaic cell stack is mounted upon a thick substrate composed of a material selected from silicon, glass, quartz, silica, alumina, ceramic, metal, graphite, and plastic. Each of the interfaces between the cells comprises a structure selected from a tunnel junction, a heterojunction, a transparent conducting oxide, and an alloying metal grid; and the top surface and/or the lower surface of the energy conversion device may contain light-trapping means.

An integrated thin-film lateral multi junction solar device and fabrication method are provided. The device includes, for instance, a substrate, and a plurality of stacks extending vertically from the substrate. Each stack may include layers, and be electrically isolated against another stack. Each stack may also include an energy storage device above the substrate, a solar cell above the energy storage device, a transparent medium above the solar cell, and a micro-optic layer of spectrally dispersive and concentrating optical devices above the transparent medium. Furthermore, the device may include a first power converter connected between the energy storage device and a power bus, and a second power converter connected between the solar cell and the power bus. Further, different solar cells of different stacks may have different absorption characteristics.

A method of disordering a layer of an optoelectronic device including; growing a plurality of lower layers; introducing an isoelectronic surfactant; growing a layer; allowing the surfactant to desorb; and growing subsequent layers all performed at a low pressure of 25 torr.

The present disclosure provides methods of fabricating a multijunction solar cell panel in which one or more of the steps are performed using an automated process. In some embodiments, the automated process uses machine vision.

A monolithic multiple solar cell includes at least three partial cells, with a semiconductor mirror placed between two partial cells. The aim of the invention is to improve the radiation stability of said solar cell. For this purpose, the semiconductor mirror has a high degree of reflection in at least one part of a spectral absorption area of the partial cell which is arranged above the semiconductor mirror and a high degree of transmission within the spectral absorption range of the partial cell arranged below the semiconductor mirror.