Effects of Texturing Silicon Wafer Surfaces Using Metal-Assisted Chemical Etching (MACE) Technique

Metal-assisted Chemical Etching (MACE) is a novel method which produce high aspect ratio semiconductor nanostructures and also can produce porous silicon without create any lattice damage. This method works well on homo- and hetero-junction p-n solar cells; GaN, SiC, InP, InGaAs, GaAs, Ge and Si. Noble metal such as Ag, Pt and Au is deposited on the semiconductor surface as a catalyst. MACE is a low-cost technique and simple way to texture silicon wafer surface. This paper presents about texturing silicon wafer surfaces using metal-assisted chemical etching (MACE) technique in order to reduce reflectance on silicon solar cells surfaces by growth the well aligned silicon nanowires. In this study the fabrication of silicon nanowires is conducted at room temperature. The solutions used for this experimental study containing hydrogen peroxide (H
2
O
2
) and hydrofluoric acid (HF) in a Teflon vessel. The results shown that some of the areas on silicon wafer surfaces are not formed silicon nanowires. This is because the effects of the MACE solution whereas not etched the whole areas of silicon wafer surfaces during the process. The morphological properties of silicon nanowires on crystalline silicon wafer were observed under field emission scanning electron microscopy (FESEM) and UV-Vis Spectrophotometer is used to measured absorption and reflectance of the samples.