The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Dec. 16, 2014
Filed:
Oct. 30, 2008
Sivalingam Sivananthan, Naperville, IL (US);
Wayne H. Lau, Ann Arbor, MI (US);
Christoph Grein, Wheaton, IL (US);
James W. Garland, Aurora, IL (US);
Sivalingam Sivananthan, Naperville, IL (US);
Wayne H. Lau, Ann Arbor, MI (US);
Christoph Grein, Wheaton, IL (US);
James W. Garland, Aurora, IL (US);
EPIR Technologies, Inc., Bolingbrook, IL (US);
Abstract
A Group II-VI photovoltaic solar cell comprising at least two and as many as five subcells stacked upon one another. Each subcell has an emitter layer and a base layer, with the base of the first subcell being made of silicon, germanium, or silicon-germanium. The remaining subcells are stacked on top of the first subcell and are ordered such that the band gap gets progressively smaller with each successive subcell. Moreover, the thicknesses of each subcell are optimized so that the current from each subcell is substantially equal to the other subcells in the stack. Examples of suitable Group II-VI semiconductors include CdTe, CdSe, CdSeTe, CdZnTe, CdMgTe, and CdHgTe.