Plasmonic hyperbolic metamaterial and nanosphere composite for light trapping as a solar cell: Numerical study

Abstract

The solar cell with wider bandwidth is interesting more than the narrowband structure. Thus, the non-homogenous structure can be used to increase the bandwidth and absorption ratio. In addition, trapping more energy is an important factor for solar cells. Therefore, the hyperbolic metamaterial is developed to provide a non-homogeneous structure. The elements shape impact on the bandwidth and electric field enhancement. The hyperbolic absorber shows 107% bandwidth which is covering 300–1100 nm and this technique can increase the bandwidth by more than 80%. In addition, as shown in this study, the hyperbolic structure can be underscored for increasing the electric and magnetic field by more than 1 dB, and thus this absorber can be used to intensity the power density to achieve higher efficiency. Finally, the nanosphere is implemented in the dielectric layer of the hyperbolic metamaterial structure to enhance the absorption of the solar cell. The P3HT is investigated as the proposed substrate for the active layer. Moreover, the spacer material can impact the reflection and the SiN layer shows the best bandwidth and reflection. This study reveals that the heterojunction structure can be supposed as a solution with hyperbolic metamaterial for plasmonic solar cells.