Analysis of Semiconductor Nanowire Arrays for

Photovoltaics
Bernd Witzigmann

Shuqing Yu

Jan Kupec

Abstract The electro-optical properties of
nanowire array solar cells are analyzed with a mi-
croscopic simulation model. For the electromagnetic
part, the vectorial Helmholtz equation is solved for
the three-dimensional structure, and a modal anal-
ysis reveals the absorption mechanisms. The elec-
tronic part is analyzed with a drift-diusion ap-
proach. It is shown that with a proper design, a
III-V nanowire array solar cell can approach the ef-
ciency of a thin-lm solar cell, while only a fraction
of the active material volume is used.
1 Introduction
Nanowire solar cells are an attractive option to
contribute to renewable energy technologies. The
main advantages that have been reported are their
high aspect ratio, which in principle allows long
light absorption paths, and short carrier extraction
paths [2]. Moreover, low defect-density III-V wires
with high lattice mismatch wires can be grown
on inexpensive Silicon substrates, which reduces
costs and allows high eciency, highly strained
multi-junction architectures[1]. Finally, nanowires
capture light using an optical micro-concentration
eect, which reduces material consumption and
makes anti-reection coatings obsolete[3]. In this
contribution, the fundamental optical and elec-
tronic mechanisms of III-V nanowire array solar
cells are analyzed, and design rules for maximum
eciency are derived. As analysis tool, three-
dimensional microscopic simulation is applied.
2 Model Description
A simulation model for nano structure solar cells
needs to take care of the electromagnetic absorption
of wavelength or sub-wavelength sized cells as well
as the photocurrent generation and carrier trans-
port.
For the calculation of the optical properties, a
three-dimensional nite-element implementation of
the vectorial Helmholtz equation in frequency do-
main is used [4]. A complex dispersive refractive

Computational Electronics and Photonics Group, Uni-

versity of Kassel, D-34121 Kassel, Germany e-mail:
bernd.witzigmann@uni-kassel.de , tel.: +49 561 8046543

Computational Electronics and Photonics Group, Uni-

versity of Kassel, D-34121 Kassel, Germany e-mail:
shuqing.yu@uni-kassel.de

Integrated Systems Laboratory, ETH Zurich, CH-8092

Zurich, Switzerland e-mail: kupec@iis.ee.ethz.ch
Figure 1: Left: nanowire array; right: core-shell
and axial pn-junction arrangement. Colormap
shows the spectrally integrated optical generation.
index accounts for the absorption, and a plane wave
excitation illuminates the periodic wire array from
top, at wavelengths covering the solar spectrum.
Perfectly matched layers terminate the simulation
domain on top and bottom, and periodic bound-
ary conditions mimic the innite lateral periodicity.
Fig. 1, left shows the basic arrangement of the nano
wires; the simulation covers only one nanowire, in-
cluding the substrate.
The electro-optical eciency calculation can be
done in two ways: the Shockley-Queisser (SQ)
method is a detailed balance analysis [5] with op-
tical carrier generation and radiative carrier re-
combination being in equilibrium. The eciency
is extracted by the Shockley equation for the I-
V characteristic in a pn-diode. Typically, the ac-
tive, current-generating volume is taken as the en-
tire semiconductor diode, therefore, details about
the doping prole or junction placement do not en-
ter the calculation. As we deal with semiconductor
nano structures where optical waveguiding eects
play a role, the SQ procedure applied in this paper
calculates the photo current as spatial integral of
the local generation rate, as calculated by the elec-
tromagnetic equations described above. The sec-
ond way to perform an eciency calculation be-
yond the SQ description is to replace the Shockley
equation by a continuity equation with a local elec-
trostatic potential from the Poisson equation. This
way, both the generation rate as well as the current
density are local quantities calculated from their
978-1-61284-978-2/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE
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B
wavelength (nm)
400nm 500nm 600nm 700nm 800nm 900nm
x
Absorptivity
0.5
Relative Modal Incoupling
Modal frequency (free space wavelength)
d = 40 nm, a = 80 nm
d = 80 nm
a = 160 nm
equiv.
Thin-Film
d = 140 nm
a = 280 nm
solid: d = 180 nm, a = 360 nm
dashed: synthesized from modal analysis
Figure 2: Top: electric eld intensity of two selected
eigenmodes of an innite nanowire array. Middle:
coupling eciency of these modes from vacuum,
calculated with the eective index. Bottom: ab-
sorptivity for an InP wire with dierent geometries,
at a constant volume ll factor [3].
respective mesoscopic equations. The eciency is
extracted from the I-V characteristics at the con-
tacts. As input to this model, the detailed doping
information, and the refractive index distribution
are needed along with the geometry of the solar
cell.
3 Electromagnetic Analysis
From a detailed modal analysis, it can be shown
that the absorption properties of a periodic nano
wire array can be decomposed into a exponential
electric eld decay in direction of the wire axis, and
a superposition of eigenmodes perpendicular to the
wire axis. This is applicable for wires without lon-
gitudinal resonances, i.e. the wire absorption and
length need to be large enough so that the electric
eld at the wire-substrate interface is negligible.
Fig. 2 shows the absorptivity spectrum (i.e. the
spatially integrated electromagnetic power density
times the material absorption) for an InP nano wire
array with dierent wire congurations. The wire
height is 2m, and the material ll factor approx.
20%, equal for all curves shown. The solid green
line is a full three-dimensional simulation with a
plane wave illumination, carried out at each wave-
length. The dashed green line results from super-
position of two modes, indicated in the top graph
of the gure by mode A and mode B. Along the
wire axis, an exponential decay is assumed. At low
wavelengths, mode A possesses an eective index
close to the vacuum index leading to ecient in-
coupling. Still, the overlap with the absorptive ma-
terial is suciently large for absorption. Mode B on
the other hand resembles a ber mode, with high
semiconductor overlap, but low incoupling due to
an eective index close to the semiconductor refrac-
tive index. At higher wavelengths, mode dispersion
leads to a change in the incoupling eciency. As
the dashed green line in the bottom gure shows,
this modal interpretation reproduces the full three-
dimensional simulation result very well, and there-
fore explains the fundamental electromagnetic be-
haviour of the nanowire array. For comparison, the
absorptivity of a thin lm device with the same ma-
terial use is plotted as black dashed curve, which
accounts to a thickness of 400 nm. Due to the lim-
ited thickness, the red side of the spectrum shows a
lower absorptivity than the nanowire array with the
ideal conguration shown in green. Nanowires too
thin show a strong cuto, and it has been shown in
[3] that there is a unique ideal combination of wire
density and thickness for which the absorptivity is
almost equal to an innite thickness bulk solar cell
with ideal anti-reection coating. Note that the
nanowire array, for this case, uses only 20% of the
material, and does not need a special anti-reection
technology.
4 Eciency Analysis
For the eciency analysis, the focus is on an InP
nanowire array. A thin-lm device with ideal
broadband anti-reective coating and 100% absorp-
tivity results in a SQ eciency of 32%. The case of
the nanowire array oers several degrees of freedom
for maximizing the eciency, such as wire height,
pitch, and diameter. Within the SQ model, dop-
ing and pn junction placement are not considered.
With the knowledge of the modal analysis described
in section 3, the height needs to be chosen so that
the exponential decay in vertical direction can ab-
sorb all the optical power down to the InP bandgap
energy, which is given for a height of 2m. The
pitch and diameter need to be chosen according to
the following criteria: the long wavelength decay of
the absorptivity in g. 2 is caused by the cutoof
the guided mode in the wire. Hence the wire diam-
eter has to be large enough to carry a mode with
characteristic wavelength that matches the material
bandgap cuto. The distance of the wires (com-
bined with the wire diameter) determines the eigen-
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Distance from the bottom of the nanowire (m)
C
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electron current density
hole current density
electron density
hole density
Active region
Figure 3: Electron and hole density and current
densities along the vertical axis of a nanowire solar
cell.
frequency of the low index mode (mode A in g.
2 which is responsible for high absorptivity below
700 nm. With this knowledge, the maximum SQ
eciency can be achieved for a wire diameters of
180nm, and a ll factor of 19.6%. This gives a SQ
eciency of 29.4%, which is 93% of the thin-lm
device. This remarkable result is a consequence of
the electromagnetic micro-concentration eect.
While the SQ analysis gives an upper limit for ef-
ciency, a more realistic eciency analysis results
from the coupled electro-optical design of nanowire
solar cells. Here, the eciency extraction of the
photo-generated carriers by drift or diusion from
the absorber material to the contacts is the focus.
In principle, only the photo-generated carriers at
locations with an electric eld or density gradient
contribute to the photo current. Fig. 3 shows
the current and carrier densities for an axial cut
through a nano wire with an applied forward volt-
age at the contacts. The pn junction is placed at
1.9m, with a p-doping (n-doping) concentration
of 1 10
18
cm
3
at the left side (5 10
18
cm
3
at the right side). The depletion zone, where the
generated electron-hole pairs are separated by the
electric eld, is only approx. 80 nm thick. Around
the depletion zone, a carrier density gradient forms,
which drives minority electrons at the p-side to the
n-contact, and minority holes vice versa to the p-
contact (the photo current is a reverse current).
This current contributes to the total photo current,
therefore, an active region can be dened from ap-
prox. 1.2m to 1.95m. Outside this active region,
the electron-hole pairs created by the sun light do
not contribute to the usable photo current; in con-
trast, they form forward currents or recombine. In
contrast to the SQ analysis, the active volume of
the solar cell is now decreased substantially, and
0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
0
0.05
0.1
0.15
0.2
0.25
0.3
0.35
0.4
Voltage (V)
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0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
0
10
20
30
40
50
60
Voltage (v)
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d
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(
m
A
/
c
m
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)


coreshell
axial
Figure 4: Top: current-voltage relationship for an
AM1.5D illuminated nanowire array solar cell in ax-
ial and core-shell conguration. Bottom: eciency
extraction for the respective congurations.
an extraction of the eciency gives a value of 20%
for the optimum nano wire case. It should be noted
that the thin-lm cell is plagued by the same reduc-
tion (21%), and therefore the conclusions of the SQ
comparison of dierent architectures is still valid.
In nanowires, besides the dopant concentration,
the pn-junction can be arranged either in axial di-
rection or in radial direction (core-shell architec-
ture). The core-shell arrangement allows for a large
pn-junction area (see Fig. 1), which increases the
active volume to almost the entire nanowire vol-
ume.
Fig. 4 shows a comparison of the eciency of a
core-shell and axially arranged nanowire solar cell.
As expected, the photo current at 0V is increased
due the increase of the active volume in the core-
shell nanowire. However, at the same time the open
circuit voltage is decreased. This leads to almost
identical eciencies for both structures (see bottom
gure). A detailed analysis shows that the open cir-
cuit voltage reduction originates from an increased
reverse saturation current (which is proportional to
the junction area). This fact has been pointed out
in [2], and clearly limits the eciency in the case
under study here.
5 Conclusion
This paper highlights some of our results for
nanowire solar cell designs. First, the electromag-
netic modal analysis claries the broadband ab-
sorption mechanisms a wire array. A design with
530
equal eciency compared to a bulk solar cell can
be achieved, with a much reduced active material
consumption. Furthermore, the coupled optical
electronic analysis reveals the benets and short-
comings of dierent pn-junction placements in the
nanowire. While an InP based wire technology has
been assumed in this study, the ndings can be ap-
plied to any material system capable of nanowire
synthesis.
6 Acknowledgements
Part of this work has been supported by the EU
FP7 project AMON-RA (FP7-241814). We want
to thank Dr. Friedhard Romer, University Kassel,
for valuable discussions.
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