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Published 1995 | public
Journal Article

New approaches to solar energy conversion using Si/liquid junctions

Abstract

New data are presented on efficient Si/liquid junction photoelectrochemical energy conversion devices. Additional information on the interfacial energetics, charge transfer kinetics, and stabilization factors of these interfaces has been obtained using a variety of chemical and electrical methods. Transconductance and Mott-Schottky measurements of the barrier height of n-Si/CH₃OH-Me₂Fc^(+/0) contacts have demonstrated that the Si is in strong inversion, with a barrier height of 1.0 eV. Qualitative evidence for the validity of Marcus-Gerischer theory was obtained in measurements of the stabilization ratio as a function of the reorganization energy of the stabilizing redox agent. In addition, a new type of photoelectrochemical cell, in which charge carriers are collected primarily using diffusion gradients as opposed to drift, has shown high efficiency and unpinned electrical junction behavior in contact with various redox couples.

Additional Information

© 1995 Published by Elsevier. We acknowledge the National Science Foundation, grant CHE-922131 for support of this research. KEP acknowledges the National Science Foundation for a graduate fellowship, and MXT is grateful to the Link Energy Foundation and the W.R. Grace Foundation for graduate fellowships. We also thank Prof. A.J. Bard for generously supplying us with a preprint of Ref. [45]. This is the contribution number from the Caltech Division of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering.

Additional details

Created:
August 22, 2023
Modified:
October 18, 2023