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GaAs is often used as a multijunction subcell due to its high material quality on GaAs substrates, despite having a non-optimal bandgap. The bandgap can be beneficially reduced using many layers of thin, strain-balanced GaInAs in a superlattice or quantum well device, but achieving excellent carrier collection without increased recombination has proven challenging. Here, we develop and demonstrate high performance, optically thick GaInAs/GaAsP strain-balanced solar cells. Excellent material quality is achieved in thick superlattices by using growth conditions that limit progressive thickness and composition fluctuations. Bandgap-voltage offsets as low as 0.31 V are shown in superlattice cells using thin, highly strained GaP barriers. Optically thick superlattice cells with over 2500 nm of total GaInAs in the depletion region are developed, enabling 3.8 mA/cm2 of extra photocurrent beyond the GaAs band edge under the AM0 space spectrum. Optimized superlattice solar cells are incorporated into two-junction devices that achieve 29.2% efficiency under the AM0 space spectrum due to their improved bandgap combination and high subcell voltages. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We demonstrate an inverted metamorphic multijunction (IMM) photovoltaic cell comprising lattice-mismatched 1.2 eV AlGaInAs and 1.0 eV GaInAs junctions optimized for high-temperature thermophotovoltaic (TPV) applications. This device differs from traditional IMM solar cells because the mismatched junctions are grown at a single lattice constant. This architecture enables removal of the compositionally graded buffer that otherwise filters light from the junctions below and absorbs sub-bandgap light via free-carrier absorption. Sub-bandgap absorption dramatically reduces the efficiency of TPV systems using high reflectivity cells to enable band edge spectrum filtering. Three components required development to enable this device: (1) a lattice-mismatched 1.2 eV AlGaInAs junction, (2) a metamorphic contact layer grown after the graded buffer, and (3) a transparent tunnel junction that sits in front of the 1.0 eV GaInAs junction. Growth conditions that minimize oxygen defect incorporation maximize AlGaInAs cell quality, enabling a 0.41 V bandgap open circuit voltage offset at 22 mA/cm2 under AM1.5D. A mismatched GaInAs:Se layer is developed as a low resistance contact. Lastly, we develop a GaAsSb:C/GaInP:Se tunnel junction suitable for high-power densities with more transparency than the GaAsSb:C/GaInAs:Se structure used in past IMM cells. We characterize the tandem device under a high-intensity spectrum that approximates the emission from a 2150 °C blackbody radiator and deduce a projected ideal TPV efficiency of 39.9% at ∼30% of the blackbody irradiance and 36% ideal TPV efficiency under the full 118 W/cm2 irradiance. Improvements to the back-surface reflectivity and series resistance are expected to increase the ideal TPV efficiency well above 40%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The optical and electrical properties of many III-V alloys change with the degree of CuPt atomic ordering, which is very sensitive to growth conditions. The bulk ordered alloy is elongated along the normal to the ordered planes, and is asymmetrically strained when coherent to a cubic substrate. Here, we demonstrate in situ measurement of the anisotropic strain due to ordering using two-dimensional wafer curvature. The measurement is sensitive to bulk anisotropies, and so is complementary to other in situ measurements that are sensitive to surface anisotropies. Using ab initio calculations, we determine a maximum strain anisotropy of 0.27% between [110] and [110] when perfectly ordered single-variant GaInP2 is coherent to a (001) cubic substrate. We relate the in situ measurement of strain anisotropy on various GaInP2 samples to ex situ measurements of the order parameter to validate the measurement and confirm the capability to predict material properties. The measurement monitors change in ordering during growth, useful for quickly determining the growth condition dependence of ordering or monitoring order-disorder transitions. More generally, this measurement technique could, in principle, be used to monitor phase changes in any epitaxial system for which the strain anisotropy of the two phases differs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ordering-induced effects on dislocations in metallic alloys have been extensively studied due to their importance in technology applications. We demonstrate that dislocation behavior in ordered III-V semiconductor alloys can be drastically different. This is because ordering in bulk metallic alloys is generally stable, whereas the surface-stabilized group-III sublattice ordering of a III-V alloy is only metastable in the bulk. Here, we show that dislocation glide can release some of the energy stored by ordering of III-V alloys, enhancing the glide of any dislocation which cuts through the ordered layers to create an antiphase boundary in the ordering pattern. This leads to an experimentally observed glide-plane switch which is unique to ordered III-V alloys. Implications for other unique strain-relaxation processes in III-V ordered alloys are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]