Composition for manufacturing electrode of solar cell, method of manufacturing same electrode, and solar cell using electrode obtained by same method

• US 8,816,193 B2
• Filed: 03/20/2007
• Issued: 08/26/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/30/2006
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Mitsubishi Materials Corporation
• Original Assignee: Mitsubishi Materials Corporation
• Inventors: Hayashi, Toshiharu, Yamasaki, Kazuhiko, Takata, Yoshiaki
• Primary Examiner(s): Mowla, Golam
• Application Number:
  US12/306,884
• Publication Number:
  US 20090250106A1
• Time in Patent Office: 2,716 Days
• Field of Search: 136/256, 136/261, 136/252, 252/512, 252/513, 252/514
• US Class Current: 136/256
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 31/022425 for solar cells
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 31/04 adapted as photovoltaic [PV] conversion devices testing thereof during manufacture H01L22/00; testing thereof after manufacture H02S50/10
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 31/18 Processes or apparatus specially adapted for the manufacture or treatment of these devices or of parts thereof
• CPC Class Codes: H01L 31/1884 Manufacture of transparent electrodes, e.g. TCO, ITO
• CPC Class Codes: H05K 1/097 Inks comprising nanoparticles and specially adapted for being sintered at low temperature H05K1/095 takes precedence
• CPC Class Codes: Y02E 10/50 Photovoltaic [PV] energy

Abstract

A composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell, comprising metal nanoparticles dispersed in a dispersive medium, wherein the metal nanoparticles contain silver nanoparticles of 75 weight % or more, the metal nanoparticles are chemically modified by a protective agent having a main chain of organic molecule comprising a carbon backbone of carbon number of 1 to 3, and the metal nanoparticles contains 70% or more in number-average of metal nanoparticles having a primary grain size within a range of 10 to 50 nm.

Claims

1. A composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell, comprising metal nanoparticles dispersed in a dispersive medium,

wherein a content of the metal nanoparticles is 2.5 to 95.0 weight %,

weight % or more of the metal nanoparticles is constituted of nanoparticles consisting of silver,

the metal nanoparticles being chemically modified by a protective agent having an organic molecular main chain comprising a carbon backbone of carbon number of 1 to 3, and

the number of the metal nanoparticles having a primary grain size of 10 to 50 nm is 70% or more of the total number of the metal nanoparticles contained in the composition.

2. The composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell according to claim 1, wherein the dispersive medium contains 1 weight % or more of water and 2 weight % or more of an alcohol group.

3. The composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell according to claim 1, wherein the dispersive medium contains one or both of members selected from a hydroxyl group and a carbonyl group.

4. The composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell according to claim 1, containing 0.02 weight % or more and less than 25 weight % of metal nanoparticles composed of one species or mixed phase or alloy of two or more species selected from the group consisting of Au, Pt, Pd, Ru, Ni, Cu, Sn, In, Zn, Fe, Cr and Mn.

5. The composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell according to claim 2, wherein the alcohol group is one or two or more selected from the group consisting of methanol, ethanol, propanol, butanol, ethylene glycol, propylene glycol, diethylene glycol, iso-bonyl hexanol, glycerol, and erythritol.

6. The composition for manufacturing an electrode of a solar cell according to claim 1, wherein the content of the metal nanoparticles is 3.5 to 90.0 weight %.