Plasmonic solar cell with randomly distributed Ag nanopaticles

Random metal-dielectric nanocomposites are excellence choices for efficient light absorption. In this work, an Ag-Si random nanocomposite is used as the active layer of solar cell. Solar cell applications request to achieve... [ view full abstract ]

Random metal-dielectric nanocomposites are excellence choices for efficient light absorption. In this work, an Ag-Si random nanocomposite is used as the active layer of solar cell. Solar cell applications request to achieve the maximum absorbance of light in the active layer and since silicon is a weak absorber at long wavelength, we have used metal nanoparticles into the active layer of the thin film solar cell [1]. Moreover we have used a random distribution of nanoparticles in order to provide a broad spectrum of Light absorption [2]. In addition, we have used the effective medium theory to describe the dielectric function of such nanocomposite system, using the Maxwell-Garnet theory along with Percus-Yevick approximation that is an appropriate model for almost all values of filling fraction of nanoparticles [3]. We have used this effective dielectric function directly related with transmittance, Absorbance and Reflectance of the nanocomposite. The effect of changing the radius and filling fraction of nanoparticles on short current density of solar cell have been investigated and we have comprehended that there is an optimum value for nanoparticles radius and filling fractions giving higher values of the reflectance. We have increased these values. We have also shown that lower values of the transmittance increases led to reduce the absorbance. However, in the obtained optimum values of radius and filling fraction, the highest values are for short current density. The results are compared with ordinary thin film silicon solar cell and the results show an increasing in the values of short current density up to 30 percent.