Background Polycrystalline Cd(Se)Te thin-film solar cells are made of a combination of cadmium (Cd), selenium (Se), and tellurium (Te) elements and exhibit efficient light absorption properties and a tunable bandgap depending on the ratio between the elements. Cd(Se)Te thin-film solar cells currently make up 5% of the global photovoltaic market, and...

The generation and recombination of mobile charge carriers (electrons and electron holes) are two vital fundamental processes determining semiconductor performance. The minority character lifetime is a measurement of the recombination and generation rates of mobile charge carriers. Time-resolved Photoluminescence (TRPL) is a measurement of the minority...

The charged-coupled device (CCD) is commonly known for its applications in digital cameras and infrared photodetectors. Although this device has been revolutionary within imaging applications, there are some shortcomings that can be improved. For instance, a conventional CCD requires a very high external voltage. High power consumption means that portable...

Multi-layered CdTe solar cell devices have properties that are promising but face low conversion efficiencies and high manufacturing costs. In contrast to typical monocrystalline Si and GaAs materials, CdTe cells are made up of polycrystalline materials and thus, have poor open circuit voltages which are responsible for the low efficiencies. Therefore,...

The state of the art of two-color focal plane arrays (FPAs) are two or three terminal photo detector pixels integrated with electronic readout circuits (ROICs). However, a multicolor (> 2) photodetector pixel requires many more terminals, making it very difficult, if not impossible, to integrate multicolor pixel arrays to ROICs due to the increase...