Potential of plasmonics in photovoltaic solar cells

One of the most promising ways to enhance the localized light absorption and to improve the efficiency of extremely thin solar cells is to use plasmonic structures. Plasmons are embedded metal nanostructures which can localize incident light on a sub-micrometric scale enabling light concentration and trapping. The current research shows that the optical broadband absorption in thin-film solar cells can be enhanced due to the local field enhancement by surface plasmons, leading to lower recombination currents, higher open circuit voltages, higher conversion efficiencies and even completely new solar-cell designs. This review paper will present the current research on different thin cell designs; on both near-field light concentration close to the nanoparticles resonance and effective light trapping. Recent significant enhancements of light absorption as well as overall efficiency enhancements have been reported for different types of thin film cells (e.g. a-Si, organic, GaAs). © Springer-Verlag 2011.