Chemical bath deposition produced ZnO nanorod arrays as an antireflective layer in the polycrystalline Si solar cells

In this work, we have employed a simple and cheap chemical bath deposition method to prepare ZnO nanorod arrays (NRAs) and investigated their application as an antireflective layer in the polycrystalline silicon solar cells. The morphology and crystalline structure of the synthesized ZnO NRAs have been studied by scanning electron microscope, X-ray diffractometer, and high resolution transmission electron microscope. It is shown that the synthesized ZnO NRAs feature a perfect crystalline wurzite structure with a diameter of approximately 40–50 nm, and have a preferential growth along [0001] direction. Moreover, it is demonstrated that the performance of the polycrystalline silicon solar cells using ZnO NRAs as an antireflective layer is much better than that of the solar cells using ZnO thin film as an antireflective layer or the solar cells without using any antireflective layer. Specifically, the photovoltaic conversion efficiency increases from 2.27% for the polycrystalline silicon solar cells without using any antireflective layer to 6.61% for the polycrystalline silicon solar cells using ZnO NRAs as an antireflective layer. This work is highly relevant to the development of an advanced process for the improvement of the performance of solar cells.