In order to maintain sustainable growth, a clean and renewable energy source is urgently required. Among all new types of energy sources, solar energy is the most promising one for it is safe, cheap, inexhaustible, and environment-friendly. In 1976, Carlson and Wronski [1] invented a new type of thin film solar cell that utilized amorphous silicon find more (a-Si) deposited from a glow discharge in silane (SiH4) and achieved a power conversion efficiency of 2.4% in AM-1 sunlight. After that, silicon thin film solar cells have been widely investigated in different ways and methods [2]. Compared with conventional solar cell, amorphous silicon thin film solar cell is low cost and could be deposited on various substrates

such as glass, stainless steel, ceramic plate, and plastic [3]. Studies focused on textured surface showed that it can buy Everolimus improve absorption

by reducing reflection. Textured surface can be conventionally obtained by either dry or wet ion etching [4–7]. In 2011, Wong and Yu [8] simulated a nanopillar-array-textured surface and came to a conclusion that it may enhance light absorption and increase the efficiency of the silicon-based solar cell. The effects of low-energy heavy ion irradiation on silicon thin film have been systematically studied during the past 50 years. During the irradiation, some traditional defects were generated; however, latent tracks, amorphous transition, or other special effects were not observed [9, 10]. Enhanced light absorption was obtained in works on n-type crystal silicon irradiated by high-energy Xe ion [11], which provided a promising method for the modification of amorphous silicon thin film. In this research, we coated a polystyrene (PS) sphere monolayer on glass substrate and fabricated silicon thin film via magnetic sputtering with glancing angle deposition (GLAD) in order to achieve periodically aligned C1GALT1 silicon nanopillar (PASiNP) arrays. The influences of silicon nanopillar diameter and Xe ion irradiation on the light absorption of thin film were studied. The mechanism of ion irradiation was also discussed. We replicate this nanostructure

by magnetic sputtering deposition with its advantage of controllable fabrication, and an expected selleck chemical enhancement in light absorption was observed. Methods Glasses were first cut into squares of about 3 × 3 cm2 in size and then thoroughly cleaned with acetone in an ultrasonic bath for 20 min. After washing off the residual acetone by deionized water, they were cleaned with ethanol in an ultrasonic bath for another 20 min. The glasses were immersed in H2SO4-H2O2 solution (3:1, v/v) for 8 h and then cleaned with deionized water in an ultrasonic bath for 30 min and with NH3-H2O2-H2O solution (1:1:3, v/v) for another 30 min. After that, glasses with hydrophilic surfaces were obtained [12]. PS nanospheres with different diameters of 200, 500, and 1,000 nm were selected here.