Low temperature vapour phase growth of ZnO aligned nanowires on ZnO:Al TCO and glass substrate for photovoltaic applications

ZnO aligned nanowires have been obtained on ZnO and ZnO:Al films by vapour phase at relatively low temperature (¡480 C). In this temperature range, which is interesting for glass-compatible processes for solar cell production, it is generally impossible to obtain a standard vapoursolid growth of these ordered nanostructures without the use of metalorganic precursors or metal catalysts, but exploiting the formation of Zn nanoclusters on the polar surface of ZnO film grains this goal has been achieved. The obtained ZnO-based nanostructured transparent conductive oxide (TCO) can be used in excitonic (e.g. DSSC) solar cell. For this reason preliminary results on the coupling with chalcogenide nanoparticles are also presented.