Analytical modelling and experimental studies of SIS tunnel solar cells

This paper presents an experimental and computational study of semiconductor-insulator-semiconductor (SIS) tunnel solar cells. A transparent and conductive film of thallium trioxide Tl2O3 has been deposited by anodic oxidation onto an n-Si(1 0 0) face to realize the SIS tunnel solar cells based on Si/SiOx/Tl2O3. An efficiency of 8.77% has been obtained under an incident power density of 33 mW cm-2 illumination condition. A PSPICE model is implemented. The calculated results show that the theoretical values are in good agreement with experimental data. Moreover, the simulation clearly demonstrates that the performance of the tested device can be significantly improved.