Electrical sintering of inkjet-printed silver electrode for c-Si solar cells

Electrical sintering of the front electrode for crystalline silicon solar cells was performed applying a constant DC current to the printed lines. Conducting lines were printed on glass substrate by a drop-on-demand (DOD) inkjet printer and silver nanoparticle ink. Specific resistance and microstructure of sintered silver lines and were measured with varying DC current. To find the relation between temperatue increase with changing applied cuurent and specific resistance, temperature elevation was also calculated. Sintering process finished within a few milliseconds. Increasing applied DC current, specific resistance decreased and grain size increased after sintering. Achieved minimum specific resistance is approximately 1.7 times higher than specific resistance of the bulk silver.