Intermediate reflectors for enhanced top cell performance in photovoltaic thin-film tandem cells

We have investigated the impact of three types of intermediate reflectors on the absorption enhancement in the top cell of micromorph tandem solar cells using rigorous diffraction theory. As intermediate reflectors we consider homogenous dielectric thin-films and 1D and 3D photonic crystals. Besides the expected absorption enhancements in cases where photonic band gaps are matched to the absorption edge of the semiconductor, our results distinguish between the impact of zero order Bragg-resonances and diffraction-based enhancement at larger lattice constants of the 3D photonic crystal. Our full-spectrum analysis permits for a quantitative prediction of the photovoltaic conversion efficiency increase of the a-Si: H top cell. (C) 2009 Optical Society of America