Slowing of carrier cooling in hot carrier solar cells

G. J. Conibeer; D. Konig; M. A. Green; J. F. Guillemoles

doi:10.1016/j.tsf.2007.12.102

Slowing of carrier cooling in hot carrier solar cells

G. J. Conibeer, D. Konig, M. A. Green, J. F. Guillemoles

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

149 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

The concept of the hot carrier cell is to absorb a wide range of photon energies and, before the resultant "hot" carriers can thermalise with the lattice, separate and collect them in the external circuit.Carrier thermalisation typically occurs in a few picoseconds, hence a significant slowing of carrier cooling is required. This has only been observed at very high illumination intensities via a "phonon bottleneck" effect. The critical factor is the decay rate of these optical phonons into acoustic phonons, which occurs primarily via the Klemens mechanism. This paper discusses interruption of this mechanism in the wide "phononic band gap" of some binary compounds and modelling of a possible replication of this in quantum dot superlattices in which there is a modulation of the acoustic impedance. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	6948-6953
Number of pages	6
Journal	Thin Solid Films
Volume	516
Issue number	20
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tsf.2007.12.102
Publication status	Published - 30 Aug 2008
Externally published	Yes
Event	Symposium on Advanced Materials and Concepts for Photovoltaics held at the EMRS 2007 Conference - Strasbourg, France Duration: 1 Jun 2007 → …

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10.1016/j.tsf.2007.12.102

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title = "Slowing of carrier cooling in hot carrier solar cells",

abstract = "The concept of the hot carrier cell is to absorb a wide range of photon energies and, before the resultant {"}hot{"} carriers can thermalise with the lattice, separate and collect them in the external circuit.Carrier thermalisation typically occurs in a few picoseconds, hence a significant slowing of carrier cooling is required. This has only been observed at very high illumination intensities via a {"}phonon bottleneck{"} effect. The critical factor is the decay rate of these optical phonons into acoustic phonons, which occurs primarily via the Klemens mechanism. This paper discusses interruption of this mechanism in the wide {"}phononic band gap{"} of some binary compounds and modelling of a possible replication of this in quantum dot superlattices in which there is a modulation of the acoustic impedance. (C) 2008 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.",

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AU - Conibeer, G. J.

AU - Konig, D.

AU - Green, M. A.

AU - Guillemoles, J. F.

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Y1 - 2008/8/30

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KW - Hot carriers

KW - Phonon bottleneck

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Slowing of carrier cooling in hot carrier solar cells

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