Strong Dimensional and Structural Dependencies of Hot Carrier Effects in InGaAs Nanowires: Implications for Photovoltaic Solar Cells

Hamidreza Esmaielpour, Nabi Isaev, Imam Makhfudz, Markus Döblinger, Jonathan J. Finley, Gregor Koblmüller

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

4 Scopus citations

Abstract

III-V nanowire structures are among the promising material systems with applications in hot carrier solar cells. These nanostructures can meet the requirements for such photovoltaic devices, i.e., the suppression of thermalization loss, an efficient hot carrier transport, and enhanced photoabsorption thanks to their unique one-dimensional (1D) geometry and density-of-states. Here, we investigate the effects of spatial confinement of photogenerated hot carriers in InGaAs-InAlAs core-shell nanowires, which presents an ideal class of hot carrier solar cell materials due to its suitable electronic properties. Using steady-state photoluminescence spectroscopy, our study reveals that by increasing the degree of spatial confinement and Auger recombination, the effects of hot carriers increase, which is in good agreement with theoretical modeling. However, for thin nanowires, the temperature of hot carriers decreases as the effects of crystal disorder increase. This observation is confirmed by probing the extent of the disorder-induced Urbach tail and linked to the presence of a higher density of stacking defects in the limit of thin nanowires. These findings expand our knowledge of hot carrier thermalization in nanowires, which can be applied for designing efficient 1D hot carrier absorbers for advanced-concept photovoltaic solar cells.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)2817-2824
Number of pages8
JournalACS Applied Nano Materials
Volume7
Issue number3
DOIs
StatePublished - 9 Feb 2024

Keywords

  • Auger recombination
  • hot carrier effects
  • nanowires
  • selective area epitaxy
  • thermalization mechanism

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