Regular Article

Chalcogenide glass-ceramic with self-organized heterojunctions: application to photovoltaic solar cells

¹ Univ. Rennes, CNRS, ISCR – UMR6226, 35000 Rennes, France
² Univ. Rennes, CNRS, IETR – UMR6164, 35000 Rennes, France
³ Aix Marseille Université, CNRS, Université de Toulon, IM2NP UMR 7334, 13397 Marseille, France

^* e-mail: michel.cathelinaud@univ-rennes1.fr

Received: 31 January 2017
Received in final form: 25 September 2017
Accepted: 10 January 2018
Published online: 16 March 2018

Abstract

In this work, we present for the first time the concept of chalcogenide glass-ceramic for photovoltaic applications with the GeSe₂–Sb₂Se₃–CuI system. It has been demonstrated that thin films, deposited with the sputtering technique, are amorphous and can be crystallized with appropriate heat treatment. The thin film glass-ceramic behaves as a p-type semiconductor, even if it contains p-type Cu₂GeSe₃ and n-type Sb₂Se₃. The conductivity of Sb₂Se₃ has been greatly improved by appropriate iodine doping. The first photovoltaic solar cells based on the association of iodine-doped Sb₂Se₃ and the glass-ceramic thin films give a short-circuit current density J_SC of 10 mA/cm² and an open-circuit voltage V_OC of 255 mV, with a power conversion efficiency of about 0.9%.