Electroluminescent study of the efficiency of silicon heterostructural solar cells

A strong (by more than an order of magnitude) change in the electroluminescence intensity is observed for the first time in high-quality heterojunction solar cells that are based on a single-crystal silicon and have an efficiency of 18 to 20.5%. This effect occurs due to the sharp change in the concentration of the recombination centers on the surface of single-crystal silicon wafers in the course of their pyramidal texturing and also due to the rise in the series resistance. The effect can be used for a quantitative highly sensitive characterization of the texturing, which is a fundamentally important stage in fabricating highly efficient silicon solar cells.