Using Measurements of Fill Factor at High Irradiance to Deduce Heterobarrier Band Offsets: Preprint

Using a 2D device simulation tool, we examine the high irradiance behavior of a single junction, GaAs concentrator cell as a function of the doping in the back surface confinement layer. The confinement layer is designed to be a barrier for both holes and electrons in the base of the solar cell. For a p-type base we show that the FF of the cell at high concentrations is a strong function of boththe magnitude of the valence band offset and the doping level in the barrier. In short, for a given valence band offset (VBO), there is a critical barrier doping, below which the FF drops rapidly with lower doping. This behavior is confirmed experimentally for a GaInP/GaAs double heterostructure solar cell where the critical doping concentration (at 500 suns) in the back surface confinementlayer is~1e18 cm-3 for a VBO of 300 meV.