Impact of the variability in the current density on the porous silicon characteristics

Abstract

Porous silicon (PS) in comparison to the bulk silicon shows new features such as shifting of the absorption edge into the short wavelength and photoluminescence visible region, it shows a new characteristics such as larger surface to volume ratio, high-intensity of nano porous structure and low refractive index which can be used as an anti-reflection coating in solar cells. In this paper, PS has been prepared from n-type silicon wafer of (100) orientation. The influence of varying current density (J) in the anodizing solution, on the performance of PS has been investigated. Scanning electron microscope (SEM), atomic force microscope (AFM), and dark, forward and reverse bias I-V measurement have been used to morphologically characterize structure and electrical properties of PS. Best results achieved when the current density is (60) mA/cm2. © 2014 Elsevier Ltd.