Journal
NANO LETTERS
Volume 11, Issue 12, Pages 5189-5195Publisher
AMER CHEMICAL SOC
DOI: 10.1021/nl2023806
Keywords
Nanowire; solar cell; photovoltaics; plasmonics; nanocrystal
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Funding
- National Science Foundation Center of Integrated Nanomechanical Systems (NSF COINS) [0832819]
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In recent photovoltaic research, nanomaterials have offered two new approaches for trapping light within solar cells to increase their absorption: nanostructuring the absorbing semiconductor and using metallic nanostructures to couple light into the absorbing layer. This work combines these two approaches by decorating a single-nanowire silicon solar cell with an octahedral silver nanocrystal. Wavelength-dependent photocurrent measurements and finite-difference time domain simulations show that increases in photocurrent arise at wavelengths corresponding to the nanocrystal's surface plasmon resonances, while decreases occur at wavelengths corresponding to optical resonances of the nanowire. Scanning photocurrent mapping with submicrometer spatial resolution experimentally confirms that changes in the device's photocurrent come from the silver nanocrystal. These results demonstrate that understanding the interactions between nanoscale absorbers and plasmonic nanostructures is essential to optimizing the efficiency of nanostructured solar cells.
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