Heterostruktury 2D a 3D materiálů pro přeměnu solární energie

The current solar cell technology is predominantly based on bulk silicon wafer cells but thin-film Si solar cells offer many advantages like flexibility and potential for multi-junction cells. However, to make thin-film Si solar cells competitive new breakthroughs are urgently needed. One of the options is to combine them with new two-dimensional (2D) materials that have recently shown many exceptional optoelectronic and mechanical properties that are still waiting to be exploited in this field. Heterostructures combining optically transparent 2D materials with 3D materials offer a large unexplored territory for the development of unique junctions and a new generation solar cells, whose electronic structure, work function and optical properties can be specifically designed and adjusted. Although 2D materials have shown severe susceptibility to ambient environment, this weakness can turn into a great advantage for solar energy conversion, providing a new route for tuning the properties of solar cell junctions. We aim to design, fabricate and study heterostructures composed of a 3D semiconductor (Si) and a doped 2D material (graphene, transition metal dichalcogenides). Planar as well as spatially nanostructured junctions of either p-n or Schottky character will be evaluated for their use in photovoltaics.