23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

COMPARISON OF EMITTER SATURATION CURRENT DENSITIES

DETERMINED BY QUASI-STEADY-STATE PHOTOCONDUCTANCE MEASUREMENTS OF
EFFECTIVE CARRIER LIFETIMES AT HIGH AND LOW INJECTIONS
C. Reichel, F. Granek, J. Benick, O. Schultz-Wittmann*, S. W. Glunz
Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems, Heidenhofstr. 2, 79110 Freiburg, Germany
Phone: +49-761-4588-5287, Fax: +49-761-4588-9250, email: christian.reichel@ise.fraunhofer.de
*now with Solexel Inc., California
ABSTRACT: Methods for the determination of the emitter saturation current density J0e in high and low injection
regime and the influence of different models for the Auger recombination on the evaluation are presented and
compared. In this study symmetrical test structures with different emitter profiles on highly doped and lowly doped
substrates have been investigated. The samples were analyzed by injection-dependent lifetime spectroscopy (IDLS)
with the contactless measurement of the photoconductance. For highly injected substrates, the model for the Auger
recombination of Kerr et al. can be used for a wider range of excess carrier densities resulting in a more conservative
estimation than with the models of Schmidt et al., Glunz et al. and Sinton et al.. With the Auger parameterisation of
Kerr et al. at low injections the same observations as in high injection regime have been made. A good agreement
was found between the different methods showing that an accurate determination of J0e is possible for both low and
high resistivity materials. The results for samples with different diffused phosphorus emitter profiles show that J0e
decreases with increasing sheet resistance which is in good agreement with other emitter studies.
Keywords: c-Si, Photoconductivity, Lifetime
1

<100>. The substrates had a specific base resistivity base

of about 0.5 cm and 100 cm and are 250 m thick.
After RCA cleaning, the phosphorous diffusions were
carried out in a tube furnace with a liquid source of
POCl3 for a duration of 30 min. The diffusion
temperatures T were varied from 810C to 870C. After
the emitter diffusion, a drive-in step for 20 min at the
same temperature in an Argon atmosphere was applied.
For the surface passivation a dry oxidation at a
temperature of 1050 C for 60 min was carried out,
resulting in an oxide thickness of nearly 110 nm. The
profiles of the diffusions were Gaussian-like and the
emitter sheet resistances were in the range of 16 / to
290 /. The diffusion profiles were determined by the
stripping-hall method and are shwon in Figure 1. The
emitter sheet resistance sheet of the diffused emitters was
measured by the four-point probe technique after the
removal of the oxide in a diluted hydrofluoric acid.
The depth of the p-n junctions were relatively deep
due to the long high-temperature oxidation step.
Additionally, the samples received a low temperature
hydrogenation treatment at 425 C for 25 min in a
forming gas ambient, consisting of 5 % H2 + 95 % N2.

INTRODUCTION

The knowledge of the saturation current density of

heavily doped emitters J0e is essential to design and
optimize high-efficiency silicon solar cells.
The main function of the emitter is the collection of
light-generated minority carriers. Besides this feature,
lowly doped emitters have also a passivation effect by
suppressing the recombination at the semiconductor
surface. With the information of the recombination in the
emitter region a prediction of the open-circuit voltage Voc
and the maximum attainable efficiency of solar cells can
be made.
The determination of J0e can be accomplished by
means of injection-dependent lifetime spectroscopy
(IDLS) with the contactless measurements of the
photoconductance of symmetrical test structures, see
Figure 1. This sophisticated technique is nowadays
widely used in the case of lowly doped substrates to
extract J0e.[1] The only assumption which has to be made
is a suitable parameterisation of the Auger recombination
in high injection regime. For highly doped substrates the
extraction of J0e is more complicated, due to the mostly
unknown parameter of the intrinsic bulk recombination at
low injections. The focus of this study is to compare the
above mentioned methods under high and low injection
conditions by determining the Auger recombination with
theoretical models.[2-5] Furthermore, the correlation
between J0e and the emitter sheet resistance of diffused
emitters with different doping profiles is shown.
2

2.2 Measurement technique

In order to determine the emitter saturation current
density J0e injection-dependent lifetime spectroscopy
(IDLS) were carried out by means of quasi-steady state
photoconductance measurements (QSSPC).[7] With this
technique, the effective carrier lifetime eff can be
calculated as a function of the measured excess carrier
density n. With the value of J0e it is possible to give a
limit for the open circuit voltage Voc,max of solar cells
when only the recombination of the investigated emitters
is considered.
The effective carrier lifetime consists of the radiative
recombination, the Shockly-Read-Hall recombination,
the Auger recombination and the recombination at the

EXPERIMENTAL PROCEDURES

2.1 Sample preparation

The silicon substrates used within the scope of this
investigation have been fabricated earlier in an emitter
study by Glunz et al..[6] The wafers are boron-doped and
float-zone grown with a surface crystal orientation of

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23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

high emitter recombiation. The effective surface

recombination velocity can then be calculated by

surface region. By using high carrier lifetime material

and/or a red light source where carriers are generated
homogeneously over the entire sample, the decay of the
carrier distribution is equal to the asymptotic decay of
transient measurements.

S eff =

J 0 e (N dop + n )
q ni

(2)

assuming that generation and recombination processes in

the space charge region can be neglected.
One can see that in high and low injection regime
equation 2 can be simplified in order to determine the
emitter saturation current density. It is worth mentioning
that our measurements were performed at a temperature
of 30 C. Nevertheless, the measured quantity J0e/qni2 has
no temperature dependence because the intrinsic carrier
concentration is already included.[11] Therefore, the
present results can be reported at a temperature of 25 C
corresponding to intrinsic carrier concentration ni of
8.79x109 cm3 (neglecting the doping dependence due to
bandgap narrowing) which has been calculated as
proposed by Green.[12] This is in contrast to former
reported values of ni used for the determination of J0e by
our group.[13]
3.1 High injection regime

Figure 1: Doping profiles and corresponding emitter

sheet resistances for the diffused phosphorus emitters of
the symmetrical test structures.[8] The diffusion
temperatures are shown in brackets.

In high injection regime, where the excess carrier

density is much larger than the doping density of the
substrate (n >> Ndop)[14], the injection level dependence
of the recombination at the emitter region and the bulk
recombination on the effective carrier lifetime can be
used to determine J0e. In high level injection one can
neglect the radiative recombination and the ShockleyRead-Hall recombination when high carrier lifetime
material is used. Then the extraction of J0e can be done
by taking into account that the Auger recombination is
non-linearly dependent on the excess carrier density
whereas the emitter recombination increases linear with
the excess carrier density.[15] In this case the bulk carrier
lifetime is dominated by the Auger recombination, shown
in Figure 2, whereas the emitter region is still in low
injection regime due to the high doping concentration.
By plotting the Auger-corrected inverse effective
carrier lifetime versus the excess carrier density, see
Figure 3, it is possible to extract J0e which is direct
proportional to the slope of the resulting straight line.[1]
The corresponding equation derived from equation 1 and
2 is

Therefore, the effective carrier lifetime can be

determined for low recombination rates at the surface by
the geometrically derived approximation presented by
Sproul[9] by

eff

rad

SRH

Auger

2S
W

(1)

whereas the radiative recombination, the Shockley-ReadHall recombination and the Auger recombination are
refered to as the bulk recombination.
3

METHODS FOR THE DETERMINATION OF THE

EMITTER SATURATION CURRENT DENSITY
AT HIGH AND LOW INJECTIONS

Due to the inhomogeneous doping in the emitter

region the excess carrier density at the surface and the
surface recombination velocity can only be calculated by
means of numerical simulations. Nevertheless, the
definition of a virtual surface at the boundary of the
space charge region at the side of the base can be very
helpful to evaluate the recombination in the emitter
region. Optically generated excess carriers reaching this
boundary from the base are going to recombine either in
the space charge region or in the volume and at the
surface of the emitter. With the information of the socalled effective surface recombination velocity an
accurate knowledge of the specific recombination
processes in the emitter region are not necessary. This
consideration is known as the quasi-static emitter
assumption which states that the time-dependent
diffusion equation in the base can be solved under static
boundary conditions if the lifetime of minority carriers in
the emitter is several orders of magnitude lower than in
the base.[10] In general, for highly-doped emitters the
quasi-static emitter assumption is fullfilled due to the

eff

Auger

SRH

2 J 0e
2

q ni W

(3)

Note that only the thickness of the sample has to be

measured. An additional feature of this method is the fact
that the Shockley-Read-Hall recombination under high
injection conditions can also be determined. The only
assumption which has to be made for determining J0e is a
suitable parameterization of the Auger recombination in
high injection regime with theoretical models such as
presented by Schmidt et al.[4], Glunz et al.[3], Kerr et al.[5]
and Sinton et al.[2] i .

at high injections using the Coulomb-enhanced Auger

recombination coefficient of 1.66x10-30 cm6
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23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

n. A fit of the line with the model of Schmidt et al.

results in a wide range of different values for J0e. For
higher excess carrier densities the application of the
model of Glunz et al. and Sinton et al. are resulting in
lower values for J0e and with the model of Schmidt et al.
much lower values for J0e can occur.
In this study the Auger parameterisation of Kerr et al.
is used because a wider range of excess carrier densities
can be utilised to determine J0e accurately by fitting the
slope of the line. Furthermore, the results are presenting a
more conservative estimation than the other models due
to higher determined values for J0e.
3.2 Low injection regime
In low injection regime, where the excess carrier
density is much lower than the doping density of the
substrate (n << Ndop)[14], the recombination at the
emitter region can only be distinguished from the bulk
recombination if a suitable assumption for the latter one
is made. For a sample without emitter and a very good
surface passivation, eff would reach the intrinsic bulk
carrier lifetime bulk,intr which is given by the radiative
recombination, the Auger recombination and the
Shockley-Read-Hall recombination. The radiative
recombination can be neglected, since it plays no
significant role under low injection conditions.
Furthermore, it is assumed that for high carrier lifetime
material the Shockley-Read-Hall recombination of the
high-quality material used in this study does not affect
the bulk recombination significantly. In this case, one
can imply that the bulk recombination mechanism is
caused by the Auger recombination only, shown in
Figure 4. The measured effective carrier lifetime can then
be deminished by the Auger recombination term of
equation 1, so that only the recombination caused by the
emitter region is taken into account.
Equation 1 can be expressed in terms of the effective
surface recombination velocity Seff by

Figure 2: Measured effective carrier lifetime (circles)

versus excess carrier density for a sample on p-type floatzone silicon with a substrate resistivity of 100 cm
(Ndop = 1.34x1014 cm-3). Also shown are the carrier
lifetimes for the different models of the Auger
recombination.
The resulting curves of the Auger-corrected inverse
effective carrier lifetimes versus excess carrier density
for the different models of the Auger recombination are
shown in Figure 3 for an untextured sample with an
emitter sheet resistance of 130 /. For a defined range
of excess carrier densities between n1 = 8x1015 cm-3 and
n2 = 2.5x1016 cm-3 fulfilling the requirement of the high
injection regime, the slope of the straight line results in
different values for J0e. This is due to the applied models
for the Auger recombination which has a deep impact on
the accuracy. The variation of the excess carrier density
range is also going to affect the accuracy of the linear fit
of the slope.

Seff =

W 1
1

2 eff bulk

(4)

whereas besides the thickness of the sample, the substrate

doping density has to be measured accurately. This
equation can only be applied for lowly injected substrates
when both the bulk and the highly doped emitter regions
are in low injection regime where they do not dependent
on the excess carrier density. At high injections the
Auger recombination is non-linearly dominated by the
excess carrier density and in this case one has to apply
the above mentioned method in high injection regime.
Table I. Calculated instrinsic bulk carrier lifetime for
different models of the Auger recombination at an excess
carrier density n of 3x1015 cm-3.
bulk,intr
[s]

Figure 3: Inverse effective carrier lifetime subtracted by

inverse Auger carrier lifetime versus excess carrier
density for different parameterisations of Auger
recombination.[2-5] For high injection regime the model of
Glunz et al. and Sinton et al. are equal.
With the model of Kerr et al. and Glunz et al. as well
as the model of Sinton at al. J0e lies between 16 fA/cm2
and 13 fA/cm2, respectively, for the specified range of

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Schmidt et al.

493

Glunz et al.

562

Kerr at al.

706

measured

550

23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

excess carrier density leads to the dramatic increase of

Seff. The requirement for the low injection regime is not
fulfilled whereas the almost linear behaviour of Seff for
excess carrier densities between n1 = 5x1014 cm-3 and
n2 = 3x1015 cm-3 fulfil the requirement at low injections.
Nevertheless, the influence of the non-linear dependence
of the Auger recombination on n can not completely be
avoided. The determination of Seff at lower excess carrier
densities would be beneficial because of the non-linear
dependence of Seff on n. With the model for the Auger
recombination of Kerr et al. J0e varies from 18 fA/cm2 to
14 fA/cm2 for the specified range of the excess carrier
density. With the model of Glunz et al. and Schmidt at
al. lower values for J0e are determined. The gradient for
the curves of Kerr et al. and Glunz et al. between the
above mentioned excess carrier densities is much lower
than for the model of Schmidt et al.
The model for the Auger recombination of Kerr et al.
is used in this investigation because higher values for J0e
are determined and in this case a more conservative
estimation than with the other models is given.

Figure 4: Measured effective carrier lifetime (circles)

versus excess carrier density for a sample on p-type floatzone silicon with a substrate resistivity of 0.5 cm
(Ndop = 3.26x1016 cm-3). Also shown are the carrier
lifetimes for the radiative recombination and for the
different models of the Auger recombination.

The theoretical intrinsic bulk carrier lifetime bulk,intr

of the investigated substrates can be calculated by
different models for the Auger recombination, shown in
Table I. Additionally, the intrinsic bulk carrier lifetime
has been measured at unprocessed wafers immersed in
hydrofluoric acid to check the theoretical calculations.
The bulk carrier lifetime was determined to be 550 s for
the substrates with a resistivity of 0.5 cm.
With the model of the Auger recombination of Glunz
et al., Schmidt et al. and Kerr et al. an intrinsic bulk
carrier lifetime in the range of the measured value for
bulk,intr has been calculated.
In Figure 5 the effective surface recombination
velocity as a function of the excess carrier density for
different parameterisations of the Auger recombination,
calculated by equation 4, are shown.

EMITTER SATURATION CURRENT DENSITY

FOR DIFFERENT EMITTER PROFILES IN HIGH
AND LOW INJECTION REGIME

4.1 Comparison of the emitter saturation current density

determined in high and low injection regime
The corresponding determination of J0e for different
emitter profiles with the methods in high and low
injection regime are shown in Figure 6 and Figure 7.
In high injection regime different slopes for different
emitter profiles can be observed. The slope for highly
doped emitters is larger than for lowly doped ones. The
application of the Auger parameterisation of Kerr et al.
shows that to the differently doped emitters the lines can
be fitted well.

Figure 6: Inverse effective lifetime subtracted by inverse

Auger lifetime versus excess carrier density for
untextured samples with different emitter profiles on
p-type float-zone silicon with a substrate resistivity of
100 cm.

Figure 5: Effective surface recombination velocity

versus excess carrier density for different parameterisations of Auger recombination models.[3-5]

In the low injection regime the effective carrier

lifetime curves for highly doped emitters are lower than
the curves for lightly doped ones due to the high

It can be seen, that at high level injections the nonlinear dependence of the Auger recombination on the

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23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

resistivities is shown. Both methods for the determination

of the emitter saturation current density are in good
agreement.
A decrease of J0e for increasing sheet can be observed
and is in good correlation to other emitter studies
performed by King et al.[16], Cuevas et al. [17] and Glunz
et al..[6]

recombination in the emitter region. The values for J0e

were determined at n = 3x1015 cm-3.
Comparing the values of J0e extracted by injection
level dependent lifetime spectroscopy in high and low
injection regime, one can observe a good agreement for
the investigated emitter diffusion profiles. These results
show that an accurate determination of J0e can be done
on low and high substrate resistivity.

Figure 8: Emitter saturation current density and

maximum open circuit voltage versus emitter sheet
resistance of test structures with different substrate
resistivities (the line is a guide to the eye).

Figure 7: Effective lifetime versus excess carrier density

for untextured samples with different emitter profiles on
p-type float-zone silicon with a substrate resistivity of
0.5 cm.

With the information of the emitter saturation current

density, it is also possible to calculate the maximum
open-circuit voltage Voc,max at the evaluation temperature
for a symmetrical test structure by

Voc =

k T J sc
ln
+ 1
q 2 J 0e

In this study the emitter saturation current density of

different doped phosphorus emitters were measured by
means of injection-dependent lifetime spectroscopy
(IDLS) with the contactless measurements of the
photoconductance in high and low injection regime. The
dependence of the Auger recombination on the
evaluation methods was investigated. At low injection
the Auger parameterisation of Kerr et al. presents a more
conservative estimation than the models of Schmidt et al.
and Glunz et al. For highly injected substrates the model
of Kerr et al. additionally allows the extraction of J0e for
a wider range of excess carrier densities. A very good
agreement was found between the different methods
showing that an accurate determination of J0e is
independent of the base resistivity and it is possible for
both low and high resistivity materials. The results for
samples with different diffused emitter profiles show that
the emitter saturation current density decreases with
increasing sheet resistance which is in good agreement
with other emitter studies.

(5)

whereas the short-circuit current density Jsc for an

illumination intensity of 100 mW/cm2 has been assumed
to be 38 mA/cm. In this case the bulk recombination is
neglected so that Voc,max is the maximum Voc that can be
achieved for solar cells using the investigated oxide
passivated emitters on both surfaces.
Table II. Emitter saturation current density determined
under high and low injection conditions at a temperature
of 25 C for different diffused emitter profiles on
untextured surfaces.
base = 0.5 cm
base = 100 cm
low injection
high injection
regime
regime
n+-diffusion
J0e
[fA/cm2]
[/]
16
130
210
290

172
16
10
8

Voc,max
[mV]

J0e
[fA/cm2]

Voc,max
[mV]

675
736
748
754

144
14
10
9

679
739
748
751

SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The authors gratefully acknowledge all members of

the Department Silicon Solar Cells Development and
Characterization for their support and encouragement.

In Figure 8 the emitter saturation current density and

calculated maximum open-circuit voltage versus emitter
sheet resistance of test structures with different substrate

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23rd European Photovoltaic Solar Energy Conference, 1-5 September 2008, Valencia, Spain

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