IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v4y2013i1d10.1038_ncomms2577.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Photon-enhanced thermionic emission from heterostructures with low interface recombination

Author

Listed:
  • J.W. Schwede

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
    Stanford University)

  • T. Sarmiento

    (Stanford University)

  • V.K. Narasimhan

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford University)

  • S.J. Rosenthal

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford University)

  • D.C. Riley

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
    Stanford University)

  • F. Schmitt

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory)

  • I. Bargatin

    (Stanford University
    University of Pennsylvania)

  • K. Sahasrabuddhe

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford University)

  • R.T. Howe

    (Stanford University)

  • J.S. Harris

    (Stanford University)

  • N.A. Melosh

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
    Stanford University)

  • Z.-X. Shen

    (Geballe Laboratory for Advanced Materials, Stanford University
    Stanford Institute for Materials and Energy Sciences, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory
    Stanford University)

Abstract

Photon-enhanced thermionic emission is a method of solar-energy conversion that promises to combine photon and thermal processes into a single mechanism, overcoming fundamental limits on the efficiency of photovoltaic cells. Photon-enhanced thermionic emission relies on vacuum emission of photoexcited electrons that are in thermal equilibrium with a semiconductor lattice, avoiding challenging non-equilibrium requirements and exotic material properties. However, although previous work demonstrated the photon-enhanced thermionic emission effect, efficiency has until now remained very low. Here we describe electron-emission measurements on a GaAs/AlGaAs heterostructure that introduces an internal interface, decoupling the basic physics of photon-enhanced thermionic emission from the vacuum emission process. Quantum efficiencies are dramatically higher than in previous experiments because of low interface recombination and are projected to increase another order of magnitude with more stable, low work-function coatings. The results highlight the effectiveness of the photon-enhanced thermionic emission process and demonstrate that efficient photon-enhanced thermionic emission is achievable, a key step towards realistic photon-enhanced thermionic emission based energy conversion.

Suggested Citation

  • J.W. Schwede & T. Sarmiento & V.K. Narasimhan & S.J. Rosenthal & D.C. Riley & F. Schmitt & I. Bargatin & K. Sahasrabuddhe & R.T. Howe & J.S. Harris & N.A. Melosh & Z.-X. Shen, 2013. "Photon-enhanced thermionic emission from heterostructures with low interface recombination," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 4(1), pages 1-6, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:4:y:2013:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms2577
    DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2577
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms2577
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/ncomms2577?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Su, Shanhe & Chen, Xiaohang & Liao, Tianjun & Chen, Jincan & Shih, Tien-Mo, 2016. "Photon-enhanced electron tunneling solar cells," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 111(C), pages 52-56.
    2. Peng, Wanli & Li, Wangyang & Chen, Xiaohang & Su, Guozhen & Chen, Jincan, 2019. "Optimum operation states and parametric selection criteria of an updated solar-driven AMTEC," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 209-216.
    3. Han, Yuan & Zhang, Houcheng & Hu, Ziyang & Hou, Shujin, 2021. "An efficient hybrid system using a graphene-based cathode vacuum thermionic energy converter to harvest the waste heat from a molten hydroxide direct carbon fuel cell," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 223(C).
    4. Yang Yang & Wei Wei Cao & Peng Xu & Bing Li Zhu & Yong Lin Bai & Bo Wang & Jun Jun Qin & Xiao Hong Bai, 2020. "Temperature-Dependent Analysis of Solid-State Photon-Enhanced Thermionic Emission Solar Energy Converter," Energies, MDPI, vol. 13(7), pages 1-10, March.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:4:y:2013:i:1:d:10.1038_ncomms2577. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.