Enhanced Photon Utilization in Single Cavity Mode Air-Bridge Thermophotovoltaic Cells

Jihun Lim; Bosun Roy-Layinde; Bin Liu; Andrej Lenert; Stephen R. Forrest

doi:10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720

Enhanced Photon Utilization in Single Cavity Mode Air-Bridge Thermophotovoltaic Cells

Jihun Lim
, Bosun Roy-Layinde
, Bin Liu
, Andrej Lenert
, Stephen R. Forrest^*

^*Corresponding author for this work

Department of Semiconductor Science and Technology

University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › peer-review

18 Scopus citations

Abstract

An air-bridge thermophotovoltaic (TPV) cell can enable nearly complete utilization of out-of-band (OOB) photons. However, the air-bridge consists of a micron-thick free-standing semiconductor membrane that can buckle during fabrication. Such a buckled membrane supports multiple optical cavity modes in the air gap between the semiconductor and the bottom, metal back surface reflector, causing up to 10% loss in OOB reflectance (R_OOB). Here we demonstrate a single cavity mode with an extremely flat In_0.53Ga_0.47As TPV membrane that exhibits R_OOB = 98.9 ± 0.1% under 1279 K blackbody illumination. The remaining 1.1% reflectance loss is attributed to free carrier absorption and cavity oscillations. The flat TPV cell exhibits a spectral efficiency ranging from 68.6% to 76.5% for emitter temperatures between 900 and 1500 K, which exceeds that of previous reflective TPV cells, and represents a 20-30% improvement compared to the buckled cell, leading to a power conversion efficiency of 31.7 ± 0.1% at 1279 K.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	2935-2939
Number of pages	5
Journal	ACS Energy Letters
Volume	8
Issue number	7
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720
State	Published - 2023.07.14

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10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720

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@article{a496a6465b944ae1982a713e7b148ed7,

title = "Enhanced Photon Utilization in Single Cavity Mode Air-Bridge Thermophotovoltaic Cells",

abstract = "An air-bridge thermophotovoltaic (TPV) cell can enable nearly complete utilization of out-of-band (OOB) photons. However, the air-bridge consists of a micron-thick free-standing semiconductor membrane that can buckle during fabrication. Such a buckled membrane supports multiple optical cavity modes in the air gap between the semiconductor and the bottom, metal back surface reflector, causing up to 10\% loss in OOB reflectance (ROOB). Here we demonstrate a single cavity mode with an extremely flat In0.53Ga0.47As TPV membrane that exhibits ROOB = 98.9 ± 0.1\% under 1279 K blackbody illumination. The remaining 1.1\% reflectance loss is attributed to free carrier absorption and cavity oscillations. The flat TPV cell exhibits a spectral efficiency ranging from 68.6\% to 76.5\% for emitter temperatures between 900 and 1500 K, which exceeds that of previous reflective TPV cells, and represents a 20-30\% improvement compared to the buckled cell, leading to a power conversion efficiency of 31.7 ± 0.1\% at 1279 K.",

author = "Jihun Lim and Bosun Roy-Layinde and Bin Liu and Andrej Lenert and Forrest, \{Stephen R.\}",

note = "Publisher Copyright: {\textcopyright} 2023 American Chemical Society.",

year = "2023",

month = jul,

day = "14",

doi = "10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720",

language = "English",

volume = "8",

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journal = "ACS Energy Letters",

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TY - JOUR

T1 - Enhanced Photon Utilization in Single Cavity Mode Air-Bridge Thermophotovoltaic Cells

AU - Lim, Jihun

AU - Roy-Layinde, Bosun

AU - Liu, Bin

AU - Lenert, Andrej

AU - Forrest, Stephen R.

PY - 2023/7/14

Y1 - 2023/7/14

N2 - An air-bridge thermophotovoltaic (TPV) cell can enable nearly complete utilization of out-of-band (OOB) photons. However, the air-bridge consists of a micron-thick free-standing semiconductor membrane that can buckle during fabrication. Such a buckled membrane supports multiple optical cavity modes in the air gap between the semiconductor and the bottom, metal back surface reflector, causing up to 10% loss in OOB reflectance (ROOB). Here we demonstrate a single cavity mode with an extremely flat In0.53Ga0.47As TPV membrane that exhibits ROOB = 98.9 ± 0.1% under 1279 K blackbody illumination. The remaining 1.1% reflectance loss is attributed to free carrier absorption and cavity oscillations. The flat TPV cell exhibits a spectral efficiency ranging from 68.6% to 76.5% for emitter temperatures between 900 and 1500 K, which exceeds that of previous reflective TPV cells, and represents a 20-30% improvement compared to the buckled cell, leading to a power conversion efficiency of 31.7 ± 0.1% at 1279 K.

AB - An air-bridge thermophotovoltaic (TPV) cell can enable nearly complete utilization of out-of-band (OOB) photons. However, the air-bridge consists of a micron-thick free-standing semiconductor membrane that can buckle during fabrication. Such a buckled membrane supports multiple optical cavity modes in the air gap between the semiconductor and the bottom, metal back surface reflector, causing up to 10% loss in OOB reflectance (ROOB). Here we demonstrate a single cavity mode with an extremely flat In0.53Ga0.47As TPV membrane that exhibits ROOB = 98.9 ± 0.1% under 1279 K blackbody illumination. The remaining 1.1% reflectance loss is attributed to free carrier absorption and cavity oscillations. The flat TPV cell exhibits a spectral efficiency ranging from 68.6% to 76.5% for emitter temperatures between 900 and 1500 K, which exceeds that of previous reflective TPV cells, and represents a 20-30% improvement compared to the buckled cell, leading to a power conversion efficiency of 31.7 ± 0.1% at 1279 K.

UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/85163292119

U2 - 10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720

DO - 10.1021/acsenergylett.3c00720

M3 - Journal article

AN - SCOPUS:85163292119

SN - 2380-8195

VL - 8

SP - 2935

EP - 2939

JO - ACS Energy Letters

JF - ACS Energy Letters

IS - 7

ER -

Enhanced Photon Utilization in Single Cavity Mode Air-Bridge Thermophotovoltaic Cells

Abstract

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