Recent progress of Spectrolab high-efficiency space solar cells

Recent progress in III-V multijunction sp ace solar cell has led to Spectrolab’s GaIn P/GaAs/Ge triple-junction, XTJ, cells with average 1-sun efficiency of 29% (AM0, 28oC) for cell size ranging from 59 to 72-cm 2 . High-efficiency inverted metamorphic (IMM) multijunction cells are developed as the next space solar cell architecture. Spectrolab’s large-area IMM3J and IMM4J cells have achieved 33% and 34% 1-sun, AM0 efficiencies, respectively. The IMM3J and the IMM4J cells have both demonstrated normalized power retention of 0.86 at 5x10 14 e - /cm 2 fluence and 0.83 and 0.82 at 1x10 15 e - /cm 2 fluence post 1-MeV electron radiation, respectively. The IMM cells were further assembled into coverglass-interconnect-cell (CIC) strings and affixed to typical rigid aluminum honeycomb panels for thermal cycling characterization. Preliminary temperature cycling data of two coupons populated with IMM cell strings showed no performance degradation. Spectrolab has also developed semiconductor bonded technology (SBT) where high-performance component subcells were grown on GaAs and InP substrates separately then bonded directly to form the final multijunction cells. Large-area SBT 5-junction cells have achieved a 35.1% efficiency under 1-sun, AM0 condition. Keywords: space solar cells, III-V multijunction, inverted me tamorphic, semiconductor bonding technology.