Abstract Efficiency enhancement of solar cells is a goal of the photovoltaic industry, and different approaches can be used to achieve this objective. For example, the modification of the incident solar spectra using down shift spectral converters covering the solar cell represents an alternative that has been reported in the literature. In this case, there is an interplay between the gain in the efficiency due to the modification of the incident solar spectra and the losses attributed to absorption and reflection of these layers. In order to mitigate this problem, an immersion oil between the solar cell and the luminescent layer can be used to match the differences between the linear refractive indices. Besides, the luminescence of rare earths in the visible spectra can be enhanced by metallic nanoparticles. Employing these strategies, we present results of germanate glasses with rare earth ions and gold nanoparticles to enhance silicon solar cell performance when used as cover layer. Efficiency increase of about 18.42% is demonstrated for silicon solar cells covered with GeO2-PbO glasses doped with Eu3+ ions and containing spherical gold nanoparticles with average size around 8 nm.

中文翻译：

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含有 Eu3+ 离子和金纳米颗粒的锗酸盐玻璃层可提高硅太阳能电池的性能

摘要 太阳能电池的效率提升是光伏产业的目标，可以使用不同的方法来实现这一目标。例如，使用覆盖太阳能电池的下移光谱转换器修改入射太阳光谱代表了文献中报道的替代方案。在这种情况下，由于入射太阳光谱的修改而导致的效率增益与归因于这些层的吸收和反射的损失之间存在相互作用。为了缓解这个问题，可以在太阳能电池和发光层之间使用浸油来匹配线性折射率之间的差异。此外，金属纳米粒子可以增强稀土在可见光谱中的发光。运用这些策略，我们展示了使用稀土离子和金纳米粒子的锗酸盐玻璃在用作覆盖层时提高硅太阳能电池性能的结果。对于覆盖有掺有 Eu3+ 离子并含有平均尺寸约为 8 nm 的球形金纳米颗粒的 GeO2-PbO 玻璃的硅太阳能电池，效率提高了约 18.42%。