xvi, 117 p. ; ill. (some col.) A print copy of this thesis is available through the UO Libraries. Search the library catalog for the location and call number. / High efficiency thin film solar cells have the potential for being a world energy solution because of their cost-effectiveness. Looking to the future of solar energy, there is the opportunity and challenge for thin film solar cells. The main theme of this research is to develop a detailed understanding of electronically active defect states and their role in limiting device performance in copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) solar cells. Metastability in the CIGS is a good tool to manipulate electronic defect density and thus identify its effect on the device performance. Especially, this approach keeps many device parameters constant, including the chemical composition, grain size, and interface layers. Understanding metastability is likely to lead to the improvement of CIGS solar cells. We observed systematic changes in CIGS device properties as a result of the metastable changes, such as increases in sub-bandgap defect densities and decreases in hole carrier mobilities. Metastable changes were characterized using high frequency admittance spectroscopy, drive-level capacitance profiling (DLCP), and current-voltage measurements. We found two distinctive capacitance steps in the high frequency admittance spectra that correspond to (1) the thermal activation of hole carriers into/out of acceptor defect and (2) a temperature-independent dielectric relaxation freeze-out process and an equivalent circuit analysis was employed to deduce the dielectric relaxation time. Finally, hole carrier mobility was deduced once hole carrier density was determined by DLCP method. We found that metastable defect creation in CIGS films can be made either by light-soaking or with forward bias current injection. The deep acceptor density and the hole carrier density were observed to increase in a 1:1 ratio, which seems to be consistent with the theoretical model of V Cu -V Se defect complex suggested by Lany and Zunger. Metastable defect creation kinetics follows a sub-linear power law in time and intensity. Numerical simulation using SCAPS-1D strongly supports a compensated donor- acceptor conversion model for the experimentally observed metastable changes in CIGS. This detailed numerical modeling yielded qualitative and quantitative agreement even for a specially fabricated bifacial CIGS solar cell. Finally, the influence of reduced hole carrier mobility and its role in limiting device performance was investigated. / Adviser: J. David Cohen

<div>In this thesis, we propose a model to predict the interfacial delamination in a flexible solar cell. The interface in a multilayer Copper Indium Gallium Diselenide (CIGS) flexible solar cell was studied applying the principles of fracture mechanics to a fixed-arm-peel test. </div><div>The principles of fracture mechanics ( J-integral and cohesive model) were implemented in a finite element software to compare the experimental with the numerical peeling force. A fixed-arm-peel test was used to obtain the peeling force for different peeling angles. This peel force and material properties from the CIGS solar cell were processed in several non-linear equations, so the energy required to start the delamination was obtained.The accuracy of the model was compared by fitting the experimental and numerical peeling force, which had a difference of 0.08 %. It is demonstrated that the peeling process for 90-degree could be replicated in COMSOL® software for a CIGS solar cell.</div>