An optically
and electrically optimum designed front electrode is reported by using a tr
ansparent conductive oxide (TCO) film integration. A subst
antial enh
ancement of light absorption was achieved by reduction of silver (Ag) grid shading losses while holding a similar series resist
ance. This obviously improves the solar cell efficiency with a signific
ant reduction in the use of Ag shading area by one fourth. Due to the optical
and electrical excellent indium-tin-oxide (ITO), the TCO benefits to widen the light tr
ansparent surface
and spont
aneously works as
an anti-reflection coating layer.
We have demonstrated that a trade-off between the optical and the electrical aspects should be considered to transfer the optical benefit by ITO supporting transparent electrode to the practical electrical advantage of current enhancement. Transmission line method was applied to profile the variation of contact resistances and specific contact resistance for optimum design of ITO-integrated front electrodes.