Yaozhong Zhang

Development of Inorganic Solar Cells by Nano-technology

Inorganic solar cells, as durable photovoltaic devices for harvesting electric energy from sun light, have received tremendous attention due to the fear of exhausting the earth’s energy resources and damaging the living environment due to greenhouse gases. Some recent developments in nanotechnology have opened up new avenues for more relevant inorganic solar cells produced by new photovoltaic conversion concepts and effective solar energy harvesting nanostructures. In this review, the multiple exciton generation effect solar cells, hot carrier solar cells, one dimensional material constructed asymmetrical schottky barrier arrays, noble nanoparticle induced plasmonic enhancement, and light trapping nanostructured semiconductor solar cells are highlighted.

A one-dimensional extremely covalent material: monatomic carbon linear chain

Polyyne and cumulene of infinite length as the typical covalent one-dimensional (1D) monatomic linear chains of carbon have been demonstrated to be metallic and semiconductor (Eg = 1.859 eV), respectively, by first-principles calculations. Comparing with single-walled carbon nanotubes, the densities are evidently low and the thermodynamic properties are similar below room temperature but much different at the high temperature range. Polyyne possesses a Youngs modulus as high as 1.304 TPa, which means it is even much stiffer than carbon nanotubes and to be the superlative strong 1D material along the axial direction. The Youngs modulus of cumulene is estimated to be 760.78 GPa. In addition, polyyne is predicted to be as a one-dimensional electronic material with very high mobility.

Advances in Conceptual Electronic Nanodevices based on 0D and 1D Nanomaterials

Nanoelectronic devices are being extensively developed in these years with a large variety of potential applications. In this article, some recent developments in nanoelectronic devices, including their principles, structures and potential applications are reviewed. As nanodevices work in nanometer dimensions, they consume much less power and function much faster than conventional microelectronic devices. Nanoelectronic devices can operate in different principles so that they can be further grouped into field emission devices, molecular devices, quantum devices, etc. Nanodevices can function as sensors, diodes, transistors, photovoltaic and light emitting devices, etc. Recent advances in both theoretical simulation and fabrication technologies expedite the development process from device design to prototype demonstration. Practical applications with a great market value from nanoelectronic devices are expected in near future.

High Potential Columnar Nanocrystalline AlN Films Deposited by RF Reactive Magnetron Sputtering

Columnar nanocrystalline aluminum nitride (cnc-AlN) thin films with (002) orientation and uniform texture have been deposited successfully on large silicon wafers by RF reactive magnetron sputtering. At the optimum sputtering parameters, the deposited cnc-AlN thin films show a c-axis preferred orientation with a crystallite size of about 28 nm and surface roughness (RMS) of about 1.29 nm. The cnc-AlN thin films were well transparent with an optical band gap about 4.8 eV, and the residual compressive stress and the defect density in the film have been revealed by Ramon spectroscopy. Moreover, piezoelectric performances of the cnc-AlN thin films executed effectively in a film bulk acoustic resonator structure.

Doping of vanadium to nanocrystalline diamond films by hot filament chemical vapor deposition.

Doping an impure element with a larger atomic volume into crystalline structure of buck crystals is normally blocked because the rigid crystalline structure could not tolerate a larger distortion. However, this difficulty may be weakened for nanocrystalline structures. Diamonds, as well as many semiconductors, have a difficulty in effective doping. Theoretical calculations carried out by DFT indicate that vanadium (V) is a dopant element for the n-type diamond semiconductor, and their several donor state levels are distributed between the conduction band and middle bandgap position in the V-doped band structure of diamond. Experimental investigation of doping vanadium into nanocrystalline diamond films (NDFs) was first attempted by hot filament chemical vapor deposition technique. Acetone/H2 gas mixtures and vanadium oxytripropoxide (VO(OCH2CH2CH3)3) solutions of acetone with V and C elemental ratios of 1:5,000, 1:2,000, and 1:1,000 were used as carbon and vanadium sources, respectively. The resistivity of the V-doped NDFs decreased two orders with the increasing V/C ratios.

Heat Conduction of Air in Nano Spacing

The scale effect of heat conduction of air in nano spacing (NS) is very important for nanodevices to improve their life and efficiency. By constructing a special technique, the changes of heat conduction of air were studied by means of measuring the heat conduction with heat conduction instrument in NS between the hot plate and the cooling plate. Carbon nanotubes were used to produce the nano spacing. The results show that when the spacing is small down to nanometer scale, heat conduction plays a prominent role in NS. It was found that the thickness of air is a non-linear parameter for demarcating the heat conduction of air in NS and the rate of heat conduction in unit area could be regard as a typical parameter for the heat conduction characterization at nanometer scale.

Group III dopant segregation and semiconductor-to-metal transition in ZnO nanowires: a first principles study

The doping modulation in semiconductor nanomaterials is key to achieving high-efficiency nanodevices. Group III dopants in ZnO nanowires are predicted to tend to segregate to the surface and induce a metallic transition at high doping concentrations due to the delocalization of donor electron wave functions.

Spontaneous formation of graphene-like stripes on high-index diamond C(331) surface

We employ first-principles density functional theory calculations to study the surface reconstruction, energetic stability, and electronic structure of diamond C(331) surface. Spontaneous formation of graphene-like stripes on the reconstructed surface is found to occur as the surface terrace C atoms transform from sp3 to sp2 hybridization upon structural relaxation. The comparison of the calculated absolute surface energies of C(331), C(111), and C(110) surfaces demonstrates the energetic stability of the graphitic-like C(331) surface. Local density of electronic states analysis reveals the occurrence of localized electronic states near the Fermi level, which may have a significant impact on the surface conductivity.