Formation of surface morphology of silicon solar cells by means of two-step photo-electrochemical etching and their characterization

The electrochemical etching of porous silicon offers many diverse opportunities for production of complex porous silicon structures located not only on the surface but also in a bulk of the silicon devices. A specific technological regime, the photo-electrochemical etching can affect bulk of the silicon device but at the same time saving its textured surface almost unchanged. Our group is the first who investigated the silicon solar cells with textured surface modified by means of photo-electrochemical etching. Etched devices demonstrated better photoelectrical characteristics if compare ones with unmodified solar cells. Our current work presents results on research of solar cells photo-electrochemically treated in HF: ethanol solution. Applied etching regime allowed us to modify the emitter's volume at the same time affecting only minimally the surface of the solar cell itself. SEM micrographs show the elevations, ripples, bumps, cracks etc. on the surface of photo-electrochemically treated solar cells. The optical ellipsometer spectra, optical microscope measurements results, SEM micrographs of surface morphology as well as light reflectivity of the photo-electrochemically treated and untreated surfaces of the solar cells investigated and discussed in this work.