Topics in Intelligent Computing and Industry Design (ICID) 2(1) (2020) 93-98 Quick Response Code Access this article online Website: www.intelcomp-design.com DOI: 10.26480/cic.01.2020.93.98 Cite The Article: Kunal Chowdhury, Ratan Mandal (2020). Advancement of Schottky Barrier Solar Cells: A Review. Topics in Intelligent Computing and Industry Design, 2(1): 93-98. ISBN: 978-1-948012-16-4 Contemporary Issues in Computing (CIC) DOI: http://doi.org/10.26480/cic.01.2020.93.98 ADVANCEMENT OF SCHOTTKY BARRIER SOLAR CELLS: A REVIEW Kunal Chowdhury a , Ratan Mandal b* a Department of Renewable Energy, Maulana Abul Kalam Azad University of Technology, West Bengal. b School of Energy Studies, Jadavpur University *Corresponding Author e-mail: ratan_mandal99@yahoo.co.in This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License CC BY 4.0, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. ARTICLE DETAILS ABSTRACT Article History: Received 26 October 2020 Accepted 27 November 2020 Available online 03 December 2020 Schottky barrier solar cells are a promising alternative to conventionally fabricated solar cells. Diffusion process used in conventional fabrication is high temperature and sophisticated process with high thermal budget. With the motive to overcome this problem fabrication of Schottky barrier solar cells were initiated with low temperature and less cost back in 1970s. From that time investigation is going on suitable material, optimum structure of Schottky barrier cells. In this paper, different aspect of Schottky barrier solar cells prior to performance enhancement are discussed with significant research outcome from the researchers in chronological order. From the studies it is found that work function difference between base semiconductor and Metal/TCO layer, Interfacial layer thickness are the key parameters of these cells. With advanced technology and materials like BSF. Surface texturing, carrier selective contacts, advanced deposition process etc. cell performance can be enhanced further. KEYWORDS Schottky, Barrier, Interfacial layer, MIS, SIS. 1. INTRODUCTION Generally solar cells have a structure of p-n junction diode when placed in a radiation produces electric power. There are various structures of solar cells based on different texturing, BSF, different materials used but all the structures are based on p-n junction. Solar cell is conventionally fabricated by high temperature diffusion process with process temperature ranges from 800-1100 o C. The base material conductivity type is changed to opposite type with higher degeneracy level. The dead layer formed due to high temperature process reduces the ultra-violet response of the cell. Si is the most common material used as base material for cell fabrication. Due to expensive diffusion process there has been search of alternative processes with lower cost and simplicity. One of such low cost and simple process is to change the conductivity of the surface of the base material by using thin metal later or comparatively thick transparent conducting oxide layer. Such cell depends on the ultra-thin insulating layer generally of insulating material. The changing of conductivity type can be done by applying suitable metal or semiconductor on the base surface. Suitable materials are determined by work function or electron affinity of the materials. The carrier generation of this kind of cell happens in the bulk region of the base semiconductor and the top metal/ conducting semiconductor with interface serves for photovoltaic collection process. The above mentioned solar cells are basically Schottky junction solar cell. Actually, the first successful solar cell was fabricated by Charles Fritts in 1883 was a MS (Metal-Semiconductor) structured cell. The cell was fabricated by a coating of selenium over thin gold layer gave efficiency of about 1% (Fritts, 1883). Since that time the research on solar cell didn’t get prior attention by the researches. The attention on this type of solar cell has been started from last few decades. The name, Schottky barrier or junction solar cell came from the name of scientist Walter H. Schottky. He developed Schottky diode with metal-semiconductor junction. 2. CELL MECHANISM The barrier formed between a semiconductor and a metal layers is predicted by Schottky-Mot rule that is basically proportional to the difference between the metal’s work function and semiconductor’s electron affinity in vacuum. Often the barrier depends lonely on work function of metal or electron affinity of semiconductor. If the Schottky barrier is quite high and significant fraction of the semiconductor’s band gap then the device acts as a minority carrier device and is favorable for solar cell application. The charge transport in the cell is happened by tunneling through the interfacial layer. The tunneling process is sensible to shape of the barrier at the interface and provides ohmic contact. Thicker interface increases tunneling resistance and decreases the cell performance. The charge transport by tunneling determines the basic I-V characteristics of these cells. 2.1 Structures Schottky barrier Solar cells generally have three structures given below, 1) MS- Metal Semiconductor. 2) MIS- Metal Insulator Semiconductor. 3) SIS- Semiconductor Insulator Semiconductor. This paper was presented at International Conference on Contemporary Issues in Computing (ICCIC-2020) - Virtual IETE Sector V, Salt Lake, Kolkata From 25th-26th July 2020