Plasma etching conditioning of textured crystalline silicon surfaces for a-Si/c-Si heterojunctions

摘要

The development of a hybrid heterojunction fabricated by growing ultrathin amorphous silicon by Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition using temperature below 250 deg C offers the potential of obtaining high efficiency solar cells deposited on glassy substrates. The surface preparation represents one of the most critical steps. The first aim of etching is to remove the native oxide layer from the surface of the crystalline wafer, before amorphous layer deposition. The possibility of obtaining this goal with a dry procedure that reduces the exposure of the sample to the environment is not trivial.