Fully Bottom‐Up Waste‐Free Growth of Ultrathin Silicon Wafer via Self‐Releasing Seed Layer (Adv. Mater. 41/2021)

Abstract

Bottom-Up Fabrication In article number 2103708, Joon-Ho Oh, Ka-Hyun Kim, and co-workers present the unprecedented fabrication of crystalline silicon wafers and solar cells by a fully bottom-up growth method without wasting substrate, in contrast to conventional technologies that sacrifice large amounts of raw material. A plasma-assisted epitaxially grown silicon seed layer with a self-organized nanogap is key for the realization of the fully bottom-up process. The results represent a technological breakthrough in advanced silicon microelectronics and photovoltaics.