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HOT CARRIER SOLAR CELLS

Get them while they’re hot

Hot carrier solar cells require mechanisms to dramatically reduce the rate at which carriers thermalize in semiconductors. Now, side-valley trapping of hot carriers with long decay lifetimes is shown to increase the chance of extraction of carriers while they are still hot.

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Fig. 1: Side-valley trapping and collection of hot carriers.

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Correspondence to Gavin Conibeer.

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Conibeer, G. Get them while they’re hot. Nat Energy 5, 280–281 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41560-020-0605-x

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