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Grant support

This work has been funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain through the Multiplier Project (RTI2018-096937-B-C21) and by the Comunidad de Madrid through the Madrid-PV2 Project (S2018/EMT-4308). M.M. acknowledges a Formacion del Personal Investigador Predoctoral Fellowship (PRE2019-087894) and E.A. acknowledges Ramon y Cajal Fellowship (RYC-2015-18539), both funded by the Ministry of Science and Innovation of Spain. M.H.Z. is grateful to Universidad Politecnica de Madrid for funding from the 'Programa Propio para Ayudas Predoctorales de la UPM'. This work was co-authored by Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC, the manager and operator of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) under Contract No. DE-AC36-08GO28308. Funding provided by the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, Solar Energy Technology Office under contracts DE-00034911 and DE-00034358.

Analysis of institutional authors

Martinez, MAuthorSvatek, SaAuthorZehender, MhAuthorDuran, IAuthorMarti, AAuthorAntolin, ECorresponding Author

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October 25, 2021
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Proceedings Paper
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Compensated contacts for three-terminal transistor solar cells

Publicated to:Conference Record Of The Ieee Photovoltaic Specialists Conference. 447-450 - 2021-01-01 (), DOI: 10.1109/PVSC43889.2021.9518987

Authors: Martínez, M; Svatek, SA; Zehender, MH; Steiner, MA; Warren, EL; Tamboli, AC; McMahon, WE; Durán, I; Martí, A; Antolín, E

Affiliations

Natl Renewable Energy Lab NREL, Golden, CO 80401 USA - Author
Univ Politecn Madrid, Inst Energia Solar IES UPM, Madrid 28040, Spain - Author

Abstract

The heterojunction bipolar transistor solar cell (HBTSC) is an alternative to conventional double-junction solar cells that combines the advantages of three-terminal architectures with a compact design. A critical part of the HBTSC fabrication is the implementation of the middle contact, the one associated to the base layer in the transistor structure, because this layer can be damaged by the diffusion of metallic species during contact annealing. As a solution we propose to implement a "compensated contact", that is, to leave a thin (< 200 nm) portion of emitter or collector between the base layer and the contact metals and compensate its doping during contact annealing. Using an Au/Zn/Au metal structure to compensate a 150 nm thick portion of the collector, we obtain a specific contact resistance similar to 8.10(-4) Omega cm(2). This value is fairly invariant for annealing temperatures between 400 and 460 degrees C and annealing times between 2 and 5 minutes, and it does not improve by adding Pd to the metallic stack. Optimizing the compensated contact technology opens the path to the realization of III-V-material-based HBTSCs with open-circuit voltages and fill factors comparable to those of conventional multijunction architectures.

Keywords

GaasHeterojunction bipolar transistor solar cellMultijunction solar cellOhmic contactsSpecific contact resistanceTransfer length method

Quality index

Bibliometric impact. Analysis of the contribution and dissemination channel

The work has been published in the journal Conference Record Of The Ieee Photovoltaic Specialists Conference, Q3 Agency Scopus (SJR), its regional focus and specialization in Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering, give it significant recognition in a specific niche of scientific knowledge at an international level.

Independientemente del impacto esperado determinado por el canal de difusión, es importante destacar el impacto real observado de la propia aportación.

Según las diferentes agencias de indexación, el número de citas acumuladas por esta publicación hasta la fecha 2025-07-11:

  • Scopus: 1

Impact and social visibility

From the perspective of influence or social adoption, and based on metrics associated with mentions and interactions provided by agencies specializing in calculating the so-called "Alternative or Social Metrics," we can highlight as of 2025-07-11:

  • The use of this contribution in bookmarks, code forks, additions to favorite lists for recurrent reading, as well as general views, indicates that someone is using the publication as a basis for their current work. This may be a notable indicator of future more formal and academic citations. This claim is supported by the result of the "Capture" indicator, which yields a total of: 6 (PlumX).

Leadership analysis of institutional authors

This work has been carried out with international collaboration, specifically with researchers from: United States of America.

There is a significant leadership presence as some of the institution’s authors appear as the first or last signer, detailed as follows: First Author (MARTINEZ GONZALEZ, MARIO) and Last Author (ANTOLIN FERNANDEZ, ELISA).

the author responsible for correspondence tasks has been ANTOLIN FERNANDEZ, ELISA.