Publications by Gaetano Parascandolo

Silicon oxide buffer layer at the p-i interface in amorphous and microcrystalline silicon solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Mathieu Charrière, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Matthieu Despeisse, Michael Elias Stückelberger

The use of intrinsic silicon oxide as a buffer layer at the p-i interface of thin-film silicon solar cells is shown to provide significant advantages. For microcrystalline silicon solar cells, when associated with highly crystalline i-layers deposited at h ...

Elsevier2014

High-efficiency microcrystalline silicon single-junction solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Matthieu Despeisse, Jordi Escarre Palou, Simon Hänni

This short communication highlights our latest results towards high-efficiency microcrystalline silicon single-junction solar cells. By combining adequate cell design with high-quality material, a new world record efficiency was achieved for single-junctio ...

Wiley-Blackwell2013

Light Harvesting Schemes for High Efficiency Thin Film Silicon Solar Cells

Christophe Ballif, Mathieu Charrière, Peter Cuony, Gaetano Parascandolo, Laura Ding, Sylvain Nicolay, Grégory Bugnon, Mathieu Gérard Boccard, Matthieu Despeisse, Corsin Battaglia, Jordi Escarre Palou, Michael Elias Stückelberger, Maximilien Joseph Marie Bonnet-Eymard

In Thin Film Silicon (TF-Si) solar cells light harvesting schemes must guarantee an efficient light trapping in the thin absorber layers without decreasing the silicon layers quality and consecutively the p-i-n diodes electrical performance. TF-Si solar ce ...

Ieee2012

Multiple-junction photoelectric device and its production process

Christophe Ballif, Peter Cuony, Gaetano Parascandolo, Matthieu Despeisse

The present invention relates to a multiple-junction photoelectric device comprising, in sequence, a substrate (4), a first conducting layer (2), at least two elementary photoelectric devices (6, 10), at least one of said elementary photoelectric devices ( ...

2012

A New View of Microcrystalline Silicon: The Role of Plasma Processing in Achieving a Dense and Stable Absorber Material for Photovoltaic Applications

Christophe Ballif, Thomas Söderström, Peter Cuony, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Matthieu Despeisse, Jakub Holovsky, Simon Hänni

To further lower production costs and increase conversion efficiency of thin-film silicon solar modules, challenges are the deposition of high-quality microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) at an increased rate and on textured substrates that guarantee efficie ...

2012

Microcrystalline and micromorph device improvements through combined plasma and material characterization techniques

Christophe Ballif, Benjamin Strahm, Andrea Feltrin, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon

Hydrogenated microcrystalline silicon (μc-Si:H) growth by very high frequency plasma-enhanced chemical vapor deposition (VHF-PECVD) is studied in an industrial-type parallel plate KAI reactor. Combined plasma and material characterization techniques allow ...

Elsevier B.V Amsterdam2011

High-rate deposition of microcrystalline silicon in a large-area PECVD reactor and integration in tandem solar cells

Christophe Ballif, Andrea Feltrin, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon

We study the high-rate deposition of microcrystalline silicon in a large-area plasma-enhanced chemical-vapor-deposition (PECVD) reactor operated at 40.68 MHz, in the little-explored process conditions of high-pressure and high-silane concentration and depl ...

2010

Research and developments in thin film silicon photovoltaics

Christophe Ballif, Sylvie Faÿ, Martin Python, Thomas Söderström, Andrea Feltrin, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Franz-Josef Haug, Matthieu Despeisse

The increasing demand for photovoltaic devices and the associated crystalline silicon feedstock demand scenario have led in the past years to the fast growth of the thin film silicon industry. The high potential for cost reduction and the suitability for b ...

2009

Development of Micromorph Cells in Large-Area Industrial Reactor

Christophe Ballif, Andrea Feltrin, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Adrian Billet, Matthieu Despeisse

The influences of the deposition pressure and silane depletion on the efficiency of single-junction microcrystalline silicon solar cells has been investigated. The efficiency is found to correlate with the ion energy which affects the density of states in ...

2009

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS ON MICROMORPH TANDEM CELLS AT IMT

Christophe Ballif, Andrea Feltrin, Gaetano Parascandolo, Grégory Bugnon, Matthieu Despeisse

The latest developments on micromorph tandem cells in small area laboratory and large area industrial PE-CVD systems are reviewed. We report on a 13.3% initial efficiency micromorph tandem cell deposited in our small area system. The development of an in-s ...

2009

Ultralong-range radiative excitation transfer between quantum dots in a planar microcavity

Vincenzo Savona, Gaetano Parascandolo, Guillaume Jean Tarel

We study the system of two quantum dots lying on the central plane of a planar semiconductor microcavity. By solving the full Maxwell problem, we demonstrate that the rate of resonant excitation transfer between the two dots decays as d(-12) as a function ...

2008

Decoherence and excitation-transfer mechanisms in semiconductor quantum dots

Gaetano Parascandolo

The aim of this thesis is to supply a theoretical study of the interaction mechanisms between quantum dots beyond the simple picture of macroatoms. Coulomb interaction between excitons, exciton-phonon interaction as well as radiative interaction are, in pa ...

EPFL2007

Long-range radiative interaction between semiconductor quantum dots

Vincenzo Savona, Gaetano Parascandolo

We develop a Maxwell-Schrodinger formalism in order to describe the radiative interaction mechanism between semiconductor quantum dots. We solve the Maxwell equations for the electromagnetic field coupled to the polarization field of a quantum dot ensemble ...

2005