Yoon Research Group (ECE, University of Utah)
Congratulations to Jaidan, Ashraful, and Donggeon on winning the EIPBN (https://eipbn.org/) Micrograph Grand Prize!
The micrograph humorously captures “Cookie Monster” trying to eat the SEM from the inside out. Also, Ashraful deliveredan excellent talk on radiation effects in CdTe, and Donggeon and Jaidan on presenting their strong posters on microdrilling and characterizations.
Ashif’s new paper has been published. “Translucent and Color-Neutral Si Solar Cells Enabled by Laser-Drilled Microfunnel Arrays“. Excellent job, Ashif!
These solar cells transmit visible light while simultaneously converting sunlight into electricity through carefully engineered microstructures. This novel architecture is particularly attractive for building-integrated photovoltaics, where daylighting, aesthetics, and energy generation must be balanced
ACS Applied Energy Materials: https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsaem.6c00389
Etee gave a poster presentation on “Characterization of CdTe Back-Contacts with Thick Alumina Reflectors”.
Ashraful delivered a talk titled “Characteristics of CdTe Solar Cells Irradiated Under Neutron Beam”.
Both senior students are making good progress in their research projects, and continue to demonstrate strong technical understanding and research independence.
We are excited to have a new publication by Etee and Ashraful on point-contact CdTe back contacts incorporating an Al₂O₃ back reflector. The work demonstrates an effective back-contact design that enhances device performance and provides valuable insights into interface engineering for CdTe solar cells.
“Microstructural Passivation of Patterned Al2O3 Back Contacts on CdS/CdTe Solar Cells”, Advanced Materials Interfaces (https://doi.org/10.1002/admi.202400501)
A new publication on translucent solar cells is now available online. It is a free access. Check it out. Excellent job, Ashif!
Translucent Si Solar Cells Patterned with Pulsed Ultraviolet Laser Beam
This study presents a fabrication technique utilizing a pulsed ultraviolet laser to produce translucent solar cells. The patterned cells preserve over 90% of the short-circuit current of their planar controls without requiring additional post-treatment. This approach offers the potential for rapid and scalable production of translucent solar cells, suitable for diverse applications, including building-integrated photovoltaics.
Advanced Energy & Sustainability Research: https://doi.org/10.1002/aesr.202400147
Yoon Research Group gave two talks at the 65th EMC (Electronic Materials Conference; Santa Barbara, CA; link).
(1) “Photovoltaic Characteristics of PERC-Like CdTe Solar Cells” by E. Roy, K. Powell and H. Yoon.
(2) “Monitoring Stability of Metal-Halide Perovskites Under Combined Stressors of Ion-Beam and Heat” by A. Chowdhury, Y. Hsu, and H. Yoon.
Ashif gave an excellent presentation on his work on perovskite solar cells. He has investigated new technologies to measure the changes in the deterioration of meta-halide perovskites under environmental stressors.
We presented two research works at the PVSC (IEEE 50th Photovoltaic Specialists Conference).
(1) “Impact of Surface Roughness in Measuring Optoelectronic Characteristics of Thin-Film Solar Cells” by D. Magginetti, S. Jeon, Y. Yoon, A. Choudhury, A. Mamun, Y. Qian, J. Gerton, and H. Yoon (IEEE link)
(2) “Design and Fabrication of PERC-Like CdTe Solar Cells Using Micropatterned Al2O3 Layer” by E. Roy, K. Powell, C. Lee, G. Xiong, and H. Yoon (IEEE link)
Our perovskite research in collaboration with U. Toledo (Prof. Yan’s group) and Los Alamos National Lab (Drs. A. Jones and M. Pettes) has been published in the Journal of Physical Chemistry-C.
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/full/10.1021/acs.jpcc.2c09122#
Focused ion beam techniques have been frequently used to section metal-halide perovskites for microstructural investigations. However, the ion beams directly irradiating the sample surface may alter its properties far different from those of pristine, potentially leading to modified deterioration mechanisms under aging stressors. Read more
We present a newly developed microcontact approach at the 49th IEEE Photovoltaic Specialists Conference. This approach allows the local transport measurements across individual grains and grain boundaries.
Thank you for your efforts in this project, mainly former members (David Magginetti and Kaden Powell), Yu-Lin, and Etee. We also thank our collaborators (First Solar, NREL) and the funding agencies (NSF, DOE).
A journal paper with Korea Aerospace University, Los Alamos National Lab, and other collaborators has been published. In this work, a high-resolution Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM) was used to study the heterogeneous electronic properties of 2D/3D materials (Ge film on MoS2). See the details here: https://aip.scitation.org/doi/full/10.1063/5.0075599.
