Photodetector with enhanced light absorption
AssigneeRCA Corporation
InventorJames Kane
Life of this patent
Estimating the term…
Abstract
A photodetector including a light transmissive electrically conducting layer having a textured surface with a semiconductor body thereon. This layer traps incident light thereby enhancing the absorption of light by the semiconductor body. A photodetector comprising a textured light transmissive electrically conducting layer of SnO.sub.2 and a body of hydrogenated amorphous silicon has a conversion efficiency about fifty percent greater than that of comparative cells. The invention also includes a method of fabricating the photodetector of the invention.
Claims18
A photodetector comprising:
- a light transmissive substrate having a smooth surface;
- a light transmissive first electrical contact, overlying said smooth surface, said first contact having a randomly textured surface which has a dominant peak-to-valley roughness greater than about 100 nanometers and a thickness greater than about 250 nanometers;
- and
- a semiconductor body overlying the textured surface of the first electrical contact.
In a photodetector comprising a light transmissive substrate having a smooth surface, a light transmissive first electrical contact overlying said smooth surface and a semiconductor body overlying the first electrical contact;
- the improvement which comprises the surface of the first electrical contact which the semiconductor body overlies being textured and having a dominant peak-to-valley roughness greater than about 100 nanometers and a thickness greater than 250 nanometers.
In a photodetector including a light transmissive substrate having a first smooth major surface, a light transmissive first electrical contact overlying said first major surface, and a semi-conductor body overlying the first electrical contact;
- the improvement which comprises the surface of the first electrical contact opposed to the surface overlying the substrate being textured and having a dominant peak-to-valley roughness greater than about 100 nanometers and a thickness greater than 250 nanometers.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.