Title of Invention

"A METHOD OF MANUFACTURING A SOLAR CELL AND SOLAR CELLS OSTAINED BY THE METHOD"

Abstract

A method of manufacturing a solar cell having a top contact pattern which consists a set of parallel narrow finger lines and wide collector lines deposited essentially at right angle to the finger lines on the semiconductor substrate characterized in that it comprises the steps of screen printing a masking paste on top of a front surface of said semiconductor substrate using a screen with a pattern structure, thereby forming a printed pattern; depositing a coating over said front surface; dissolving said the masking paste and selectively lifting - off the part of the coating deposited on top of the masking paste and thereafter screen printing the set of finger lines in openings formed in said coating using a screen with said pattern structure and drying in a known manner the set of contact finger lines; printing and drying in known manner the wide collector lines on the top of the set of finger lines' and firing both finger lines and collector lines in a known manner in a single final step in order to form an ohmic contact between the finger lines and the semiconductor substrate and between the finger lines and the wide collector lines.

Full Text

The present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a solar cell and solar cells obtained by the method. Object of the Invention The present invention is related to a method of preparing contacts on the surface of the semiconductor substrates. The present invention is also related to products obtained by this method and more particularly to a solar cell. State of the Art Conventional screen printing is currently used in a mass scale production of solar cells. Typically the top contact pattern of a solar cell consists in a set of parallel narrow finger lines and wide collector lines deposited essentially at right angle to the finger lines on the semiconductor substrate or wafer. Such front contact formation of crystalline solar cell is performed with standard screen printing techniques. It has advantages in terras of production simplicity, automation and low production cost. Low series resistance and low metal coverage (low front surface shadowing) are basic requirements for the front surface metallization. According to the document Hybrid Circuit no. 30, January 1993, "Thick-film Fine-line Fabrication Technique -Application to Front Metalizatation of Solar Cells" by A. Dziedzic, J. Nijs and J. Szlufcik, minimum metallization widths of 100-150 µm are obtained using conventional screen printing. This causes a relatively high shading 'of the front solar cell surface. In order to decrease the shading, a high distance between the contacting lines, i.e. 2 to 3 mm is required. On the other hand this implies the use of a highly doped, conductive emitter layer. However, the heavy emitter doping induces a poor response of the solar cell to short wavelength light. Narrower conductive lines can be printed using ultra-thin stainless steel wire screens with a high mesh density of 325 or 400.) A thin masking emulsion with a thickness of 5-15 µm is required to produce a line definition on the screen of at least/ 50 µm . Although a line width of 50 µm can be achieved, the line thickness decreases below 10 µm measured after the firing process. This gives rise to increased line resistance causing high power dissipation particularly in the main collector lines. The fact that the fingers are ultra-thin can result in the interruption of such fingers. Another main disadvantage of the ultra-thin screens is their higher cost and lower durability and/or reliability. An alternative technique to the standard screen printing is the application of an etched or electroformed metal mask. The manufacturing process of such mask involves etching of a cavity pattern on the one side of the metal foil a mesh pattern on the reverse side. Photoresist masking and precise mask positioning are necessary for double-sided etching of the metal foil. This implies a complicated design and a very high screen cost. In the case of conventional wire mesh screens as well as in the case of the metal etched screens, the open area (mesh openings) is usually not higher than 50% of the pattern. The open area defines the maximum amount of paste transferred to the substrates and at the same time the wee line thickness. Another important point is that a small mesh aperture requires utilisation of special inks formulated for fine line printing. This is in conflict with most of the commercially available silver pastes for solar cell front contact metallization. Silver powder has a tendency tc create agglomerates of particles in the paste. In addition a flake-shaped silver powder, usually used in the paste formulation for a solar metallization, increases the tendencies to create the agglomerates. The modern solar cell processing includes growing of thin thermal oxide( 50 - 250 A) on the top emitter surface using methods well known in microelectronics. Such an oxide layer passivate defects and recombination centers always present on the semiconductor surface. This process leads to an improvement of cell response to solar short wavelength radiation what in effect give rise to a higher cell efficiency. Although commercially available screen printed .pastes produce good contact to non- oxidised silicon surface, the firing through thermal oxide give difficulties in obtaining high quality contacts with low resistance. In should be also noted that the solar cell manufacturing process includes in most cases an antireflection (AR) coating which can be deposited before or after the contact's formation. If the AR layer is deposited before contact printing it often gives rise to the problem of high contact resistance between jilicon and printed contacts. This problem occurs particularly when silicon nitride is used as an antireflection coating. If an AR is deposited after the contact formation, another problem is raising and which is the soldering of the collector lines during the module fabrication. The solution to this problem brings the "firing through" method lie-scribed in Patent Application Publication WO 89/12312 -' wherein the authors apply the commercially available silver paste from "Ferro # 3349" to "fire through" silicon nitride ARC. The "firing through" TiO2 AR layer is described in the paper Nunoi et al. "High performance BSF silicon solar cell with fire through contacts printed on AR coating" 14th IEEE PV Specialists Conference- 1980, San Diego, USA, pp. 805-810. Document WO 92/22928 desribes a solar cell and a method to make it wherein on a semiconductor substrate an antireflective coating is deposited before that a set of narrow elongated parallel electrodes are printed and wherein finally a second set of elongated electrodes are affixed to each of the former electrodes. It should be noted that the paste or the ink used in order to form the array of narrow elongated parallel electrodes is such that it penetrates said antireflective material and forms an adherence mechanical and low resistant electrical contact with the front surface of the semiconductor substrate. This means that not all the conventional pastes can be used. Furthermore, in order to have such good contact between the semiconductor substrate and the narrow elongated parallel electrodes, a step of "firing through" is necessary. The firing at the same time through the thermally grown silicon dioxide and antireflection coating (particularly silicon nitride) layers, although described in the technical literature, gives usually problems of a high contact resistance and is difficult to achieve with commercial pastes. Document EP-A-0002550 describes a method of forming a contact configuration for soldering a metal connection en a region of the surface of a semiconductor body comprising the provision by serigraphy on at least a part of said region of a conductive paste which comprises as least a principal metal, said paste is then vitrifed thermally in such circumstances that the dopant migrates into at least a surface part on the region of a surface of a semiconductor body. Aims of the present invention The present invention aims to have improved semiconductor devices such as solar cells which do not have the drawbacks of the state of the art. More particulary, the present invention aims to perform semiconductor devices such as solar cells wherein the electrical contacts show a low series resistance and a low metal coverage which will give also a low front surface shadowing. .Many other advantages will be mentioned hereunder in the description of the main characteristics of the present invention. Main characteristics of the present invention The present invention is related to a method of preparing on a solar cell the top contact pattern which consists in a set of parallel narrow finger lines and wide collector lines deposited essentially at right angle to the finger lines on the semiconductor substrate characterized in that it comprises at least the following steps: (a) screen printing and drying the set of contact finger lines; (b) printing and drying the wide collector lines on the top of the set of finger lines in a subsequent step; (c) firing both finger lines and collector lines in a single final final step in order to form an ohmic contact between the finger lines and the semiconducuor substrate and between the finger lines and the wide collector lines. According to a first preferred embodiment, the following steps are performed before the screen printing step of the contact fingers lines: (1) screen printing on the top of the front surface of the semiconductor substrate, a masking paste so that the printed pattern will form the pattern for the set of parallel finger lines; (2) depositing an antireflection coating over the whole front surface; (3) dissolving the masking paste and selectively lifting-off this part of the antireflection coating which has been deposited on the top of the masking paste; (4) etching-off the oxide layers from the openings in the antireflection coating; (5) performing the steps (a) , (b) and (c) as described hereabove. According to another possible embodiment of the present invention, an antireflection coating is deposited in an intermediate step after printing and drying the front contact finger lines and before the collector lines are printed and dried-.- The ;several methods described hereabove can be applied to substrates having already a rear ohmic contact or a back contact can be formed with the front contact or after the front contact has been already fabricated. It should be noted that according to the method of the present invention, the last step is only a co-firing step and not a step of firing through. The screen for printing the set of narrow parallel finger lines is preferably made from a solid metal foil in which the set of parallel lines which reflect the finger contact pattern can be chemically etched or cut by a laser or an electron beam. However, in some particular embodiments wherein bridges made over the openings are allowed, other mask than metal stencil mark can be used such as mesh screen. The screen used for printing the collector lines is preferably made of a conventional mesh screen or a metal stencil screen. . Other techniques such as ink-jet printing or offset printing can also be used in the present invention for printing the collector lines. The solar cell and more particularly the top contact pattern of the solar cell is characterized by the fact that the collector lines are overlapping the finger lines. This means that the thickness of the finger lines can be less high than the thickness of the collector lines. The proposed invention results in many advantages over using conventional screen printing techniques: Concerning finger lines: 1. The pattern of parallel finger lines is formed in a solid metal foil which means that it has an open area equal to 100% No meshes are present in the pattern openings. This increases the volume of the paste transferred to a substrate in a printing process. It should be noted that using a standard wire mesh screen, the open area is only comprised between 40%-60%. 2. The absence of the meshes in the openings reduces the requirements for good screen printability of pastes used for front contact printing. Pastes with a high solid content and high viscosity can be used. 3 . Using a laser or an electron or ion beam for metal mask cutting gives the possibility to obtain a pattern definition down to a few micrometers. This depends on the metal foil thickness and the quality of the cutting system. In practice the line width is limited by the requirement of a high line thickness. The thicker the metal mask the higher is the thickness of the printed lines. On the other hand the ratio of the cut line width to the mask thickness should be above 0.5. A lower ratio leads to difficulties in paste transfer through the masks' openings during printing. It has been demonstrated that laser cutting can fabricate a finger pattern of 30 µm wide lines cut in a 50-60 µm thick stainless steel foil. The result of the advantages numbered 1-3 gives the possibility of printing very narrow lines with a high aspect ratio.:and no interruptions. Lines with width of 40 µm and up to 25-30 µm thickness have been measured after printing and drying. This corresponds to 13-16 µm thick lines after firing. A metal sheet resistance of 1-2 mohm/sq - was measured in most cases of commercially available specialised pastes for solar cells front contacts. 4. Furthermore, using solid stainless steel stencils instead of wire mesh screens for printing the finger lines increases the durability of the screens. 5. Cutting the continuous and completely open lines by laser or electron beam simplify the screen fabrication process and strongly decrease the screen cost. Concerning collector lines: 1. A collector pattern is preferably prepared with a conventional wire mesh screen or with solid metal masks. A durable screen with a total (screen+emulsion) thickness above 100 µm can be used. A standard screen with a mesh density of 200 or 180 (per inch dovered with a 20 µm thick emulsion is typical for collector printing. 2. The thick collector lines with a sheet resistance below 1mohm/sq. will be easily obtained with most of the silver pastes for front contact metallization. The width of the collector lines can be decreased, giving lower shading. Using the preferred embodiment of the present invention wherein prior to the screen printing of the finger lines, a screen printing of a masking paste is performed with the deposition of anti-reflection coating, the following advantages can be noted: Concerning the masking paste: The role of the masking paste is to provide selective mask for an antireflection coating deposition at these region of oxidized silicon substrates where the front contact finger lines are going to be printed. The masking paste after the drying or curing process should stay intact during the ARC deposition an be easily removed later lifting-off the AR layer deposited on the top of it. The pastes containing fine metal powders or powders of silicon oxide, titanium oxide--ox chalk- powder mixed with an organic vehicle fulfill the task. These pastes are easily removed in organic solvents Concerning the front finger contact paste: Since there is no intermediate layer between the printed front finger contact and silicon substrate and since the applied laser cut stencil screens have no blocking meshes the requirement for the front contact silver pastes are much reduced and the most of the silver pastes specialized for the front contact formation can he applied in the present invention. Concerning the front collector paste: The paste applied for the collector lines can be the same silver paste as for the front fingers or any other high conductive paste which gives a good adherence to an antireflection coating layer, doesn't penetrate completely through the ARC and provide a perfect low ohmic contact to finger lines. Furthermore, in the case than an antiref lection coating is used, the following advantages could be mentioned: 1. Both finger and collector lines are co-fired in the same firing process. As a result, the finger lines are in a good electrical contact with the substrate, and the collector lines are in a good electrical contact with the finger lines, in any cases the collector lines being not covered by an AR layer. This gives no soldering problem of collector lines during a module fabrication. 2 . Separation of the collector lines from the direct contact with silicon substrate reduces carrier recombination losses existing at the metal contact-silicon interface. Selection of a material used for an AR coating and of a deposition technique is crucial for achieving a separation. Most top contact silver pastes penetrate through an AR layer of titanium dioxide deposited by Atmospheric Pressure Chemical Vapour Deposition (APCVD) In the case of using a silicon nitride AR layer deposited by Plasma Enhanced CVD, such AR layer can be a very good barrier between silicon and most of screen printed silver pastes. 3. Solar cell contacts prepared according to the present invention can have contact finger lines placed much more closely without additional shadowing. Solar cells with lightly doped emitter and a higher sheet resistance can be fabricated by a screen printing solar cell process. It results in an improvement of solar cell response to short wavelength light. Accordingly, the solar cells having electrical contacts prepared with the method according to the present invention shows: - low sheet resistance of fingers - lower sheet resistance of collectors - lower contact resistance of finger/substrate interface - lower series resistance of solar cell - lower shadowing losses caused by fingers - lower shadowing losses caused by collector lines - lower solar cell total shadowing losses - lower carrier recombination losses at a contact silicon interface. Accordingly, the present invention relates to a method of manufacturing a solar cell having a top contact pattern which consists a set of parallel narrow finger lines and wide collector lines deposited essentially at right angle to the finger lines on the semiconductor substrate characterized in that it comprises the steps of: screen printing a masking paste on top of a front surface of said semiconductor substra.te using a screen with a pattern structure, thereby forming a printed pattern; depositing a coating over said front surface; dissolving said the masking paste and selectively lifting -off the part of the coating deposited on top of the masking paste and thereafter screen printing the set of finger lines in openings formed in said coating using a screen with said pattern structure and drying in a known manner the set of contact finger lines; printing and drying in a known manner the wide collector lines on the top of the set of finger lines; and firing both finger lines and collector lines in a known manner in a single final step in order to form an ohmic contact between the finger lines and the semiconductor substrate and between the finger lines and the wide collector lines. Brief description of the drawings The present invention will be described using a solar cell contact pattern as an example, presented on the drawings wherein: Fig. 1 is a schematic view of the top contact pattern containing both contact collector lines and contact finger lines. Fig. 2 is a schematic view of the top contact finger pattern obtained by a separation of finger printing from collector printing. The whole manufacturing process of a solar cell will be described on Figs. 3a to 3i for one preferred embodiment of the invention, while Figs. 4d to 4g described the manufacturing process according to another possible embodiment of the present invention. Detailed description of several embodiments of the present invention I. Preparation of screens: 1. A standard fabric screen is stretched and glued to a frame adequate to the used screen printer. Typical parameters are: metal screen of 80 UT, orientation of wires to a frame at an angle of 90° and tension of the screen 30 N. 2. An emulsion typical for screen patterning is deposited over the screen and dried. 3. A solid metal foil with thickness of 40-60^m is bonded at its peripherals to the standard fabric screen stretched on the frame. The meshes of the fabric screen are cut away from the middle region of the foil where the pattern will be formed. 4. A set of paralle lines reflecting the finger pattern of solar cell contacts is cut by a laser beam. An electron or ion beam can also be used for the cutting process. The width of cut lines is regulated by the beam diameter, the power, and the cutting speed. A typical contact finger screen consists of lines with width of 40-50 µm and a distance between them of 1.2-1.5 mm cut in a stainless steel foil with a thickness of 50-60 µm. The area of finger lines is between 3% and 4% of the total top surface. 5. The collector lines screen is prepared by standard techniques using wire mesh screen or by laser cutting in a metal foil. A standard screen with a mesh density of (165; is typical for this application. The metal foil bonded to a fabric screen as described in I.I is used for the preparation of a laser cut screen. Typical collector line width is between 1-1.5 mm. Other techniques such as ink-jet printing or offset printing can be used in the present invention for printing the collector lines. II. Description of the manufacturing processes of solar cells: The starting material which is represented on Fig. 3a is a "as cut" Cz monocrystalline or multicrystalline silicon substrate (1) and will be submitted to the following steps -. 1. Saw damage etching Saw damage etching can be performed in an acid or caustic solution. Hot sodium hydroxide or potassium hydroxide is used more often for a removal of surface damaged layer. Typically a concentration of 20-30% NaOH solution in water and at a temperature of 90-95°C is used. Time ' of- 5—-minutes is sufficient to etch away 20µm from each side of wafer. This is followed by a thorough rinsing in DI water. 2. Texturing Texturing process is done according to the well known process in a solar cell technology: 2% weight solution of sodium hydroxide in 90% DI and 10% isopropanol volume solution is heated to a temperature of 75-80°C wafers are immersed in the solution for 15-30 minutes rinsing in DI water 3. Chemical cleaning Phosphorus diffusion is usually preceded by chemical cleaning. In the present case, it is dipped in a 4:1 solution of sulphuric acid and hydrogen peroxide, followed by rinsing in DI water. Next the wafers are dipped in a 1% solution of hydrofluoric acid and rinsing in DI water. Other cleaning methods like RCA-clean or rinsing in HC1 solution can also be used. 4. Phosphorus diffusion (Fig. 3b) Phosphorus diffusion can be done by any means known in microelectronics: gaseous source, using spin-on solution or screen printing a phosphorus paste. More information concerning this step can be found in EP-B-0108065. In the present embodiment, the diffusion is done by screen printing a phosphorus paste on the top substrate surface (1) in order to create a n+ layer (2) . Diffusion was carried out in a conveyor belt furnace at a peak temperature of 910°C. Diffusion glass is removed by dipping the wafers in 10%-25% hydrofluoric acid for about 30s. The sheet resistance of the diffused layer is in the range of 45-50 ohm/sq. 5. Dry silicon dioxide growth (Fig. 3c) The process of dry silicon growth is well known and widely described in microelectronics literature. The thin passivation layer (3) of silicon dioxide is usually grown in an open tube furnace in dry oxygen atmosphere at a temperature range from 800°C to 900°C. In the present embodiment, a temperature of 800°C and time of 15 minutes is used for growing 150A thick silicon dioxide layer (3) . 6. Masking paste printing and drying (Fig.3d) A front contact metal stencil screen with a finger pattern as shown in Fig. 2 is used for a masking paste printing(4). The paste is subsequently dried at temperature around 100-300 °C. In this embodiment of present invention the paste comprising 60% wt. titanium dioxide powder and 40% wt. butyl carbitol is used. 7. Antireflection coating deposition (Fig. 3e) Antireflection coating (5) can be fabricated by means and using any material known in microelectronics for antireflection coating deposition. However, the property of AR layer influences the next processing steps and solar cell characteristics. In this embodiment of present invention PECVD silicon nitride is applied. 8. Masking paste removal and selective ARC lift-off (Fig. 3f) Substrates are immersed in an organic solvent (isopropyl alcohol, acetone or butyl carbitol or others) which can dissolve the masking paste and leave the AR layer intact. A solution of sulphuric acid (4 vol. parts) and hydrogen peroxide (1 vol. part) an be also used when ARC is fabricated by silicon nitride. Dissolving the masking paste lifts-off the AR layer deposited on its top and creates the openings in AR layer. The AR layer can be used now as a mask for a thermal oxide etching in the openings This uncovers selectively the silicon surface in the areas where the front" finger pattern will be printed. It should be mentioned, however, that if an applied paste fires through a thei.aal oxide, an etching step can be omitted. 9. Printing and drying a front contact finger pattern (Fig. A front metal stencil screen with the same finger pattern (6) as in the step 6 is used for a front contact screen printing. The silicon surface in the contact areas is not covered by any layer ( oxide or ARC) so all problems related to a high contact resistance created by intermediate layers between screen printed metal layers and silicon are solved. As a result any silver paste suitable for a solar cell front contact metallization can be applied. Modem screen printers equipped with an optical alignment system can be applied. The pattern printing is followed by drying in an IR-dryer at temperature 125 °C-150 °C. The line width as low as 40 Mm has been obtained. 10. Top contact collector printing and drying (Fig. 3h) . Top contact collector lines (7) are printed and dried in a temperature range 125 °C-150 °C. A thick standard mesh screen or stencil screen can he applied what in effect gives the possibility of printing very thick collector lines with a low resistance. The complete top contact pattern as shown in Fig. 1 is obtained. The collector lines (7) are not covered by an AR layer (5) what gives no problem in soldering during a module fabrication. The paste used for collector line printing can be the same silver paste as for a front finger pattern or different. 11. Back contact printing and drying and all -cOntacts firing (Fig. 3i) The back side of the wafer is cover by silver-aluminium paste or aluminium paste (9) with small apertures where silver paste slightly overlapping the adjacent aluminium layer can be later printed. The silver areas are used for a tab attachment during the module fabrication. All pastes are co-fired in one step preferably in an IR furnace. During the firing process silver finger lines (6) are sintered together with n+ silicon surface creating a good electrical contact. At the same time collector lines (7) and finger lines are sintered together creating a good electrical contact. There are intermediate ARC (5) and SiO2 (3) layers between the collector lines and silicon substrate (1) . Depending which materials are used for an ARC and collector lines, the collector is in contact with silicon or isolated. The best results are obtained where pastes don't penetrate to silicon surface. This reduces carrier recombination losses at metal silicon interface. 12. Edgre isolation. In the embodiment of the present invention, edge isolation is carried out by scribing and cleaving off the cell edges. There are many known techniques which can be also applied: plasma etching, chemical etching, laser scribing and others. 13. Measurements of solar cell parameters. Another possible embodiment of the present invention will be described with reference to Fig. 4d to 4g wherein the first steps (steps 1 to 5) are exactly the same as the one described in the preferred embodiment of the present invention (see Fig. 3a to 3c). 6. Bach contact deposition and firing (Fig. 3d) ' Back contacts (9) can be applied by screen printing any specialized paste for contacting p-type silicon (8) . It can be either a silver aluminum paste or an aluminum paste. This is followed by drying and firing process. 7. Printin and drin a front contact finer attern (Fi. A front contact metal stencil screen with a finger pattern as shown in Fig. 2 is used for a front contact screen printing. Any silver paste (6) fabricated for a solar cell metallization can be applied on the front solar cell surface. The contact printing or screen printing with a small snap-off distance gives the best line definition. The pattern printing is followed by drying in an IR dryer at temperature of 300°C to 350°C. The drying temperature should be slightly higher than a processing temperature of an antiref lection coating deposition. 8. Antiref lection coating deposition (Fig. 3f) Antiref lection coating deposition (11) can be done by any means and using any material known in microelectronics for an antiref lection coating deposition. However, the property of the AR layer influences the solar cell characteristics. In this embodiment of the present invention, an APCVD titanium dioxide or PECVD silicon nitride are applied. 9. Top contact collector printing and drying (Fig.3g) Top contact collector lines (7) are printed and dried in a temperature range of 125°C-150°C. A thick standard mesh screen or stencil screen can be applied. The complete top contact pattern as shown in Fig. 1 is obtained. The collector lines (7) are not covered by an ARC layer (11) what later gives no problem in soldering during a module fabrication. 10. Top contact co-firing During the top contact firing process, silver finger lines (6) and silver collector lines (7) are sintered together creating a good electrical contact. There is an intermediate ARC layer (11) between the collector lines (8) and the silicon substrate (1). Depending which material is used for an ARC, the collector lines (7) are in contact with silicon or isolated. Most of the commercially available pastes easily fire through APCVD titanium dioxide ARC giving a good electrical contact with silicon. On the other hand, PECVD silicon nitride is highly resistant to chemical and mechanical attack, being a good insulating layer between the silver collector lines and the silicon surface. In the latter case, the collector do not enhance to carrier recombination losses occurring at silicon metal contact interface. 11. Edge isolation In the embodiment of the present invention, edge isolation is carried out by scribing and then cleaving off the cell edges. There are many known techniques which can also be applied: plasma etching, chemical etching, laser sribing and others. 12. Measurements of solar cell parameters WE CLAIM: 1. A method of manufacturing a solar cell having a top contact pattern which consists a set of parallel narrow finger lines and wide collector lines deposited essentially at right angle to the finger lines on the semiconductor substrate characterized in that it comprises the steps of: screen printing a masking paste on top of a front surface of said semiconductor substrate using a screen with a pattern structure, thereby forming a printed pattern; depositing a coating over said front surface; dissolving said the masking paste and selectively lifting -off the part of the coating deposited on top of the masking paste and thereafter screen printing the set of finger lines in openings formed in said coating using a screen with said pattern structure and drying in a known manner the set of contact finger lines; printing and drying in a known manner the wide collector lines on the top of the set of finger lines; and firing both finger lines and collector lines in a known manner in a single final step in order to form an ohmic contact between the finger lines and the semiconductor substrate and between the finger lines and the wide collector lines. 2. The method as claimed in claim 1, wherein the said coating is an antireflection layer. 3. The method as claimed in claims 1 and 2, wherein the said step of depositing a coating over the front surface comprises depositing an antireflection layer. 4. The method as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein a substrate already having a rear ohmic contract is used or a back contact is formed with the front contact or later after the front contact has been already fabricated. 5. The method as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the said step of screen printing the set of finger lines is made of a solid metal mask in which the set of parallel lines which reflect the finger contact pattern is chemically etched or cut by a laser or an electron or ion beam in a metal foil. 6. The method as claimed in any one of the preceding claims, wherein the said collector lines are printed by screen printing, ink-jet printing or off-set printing. 7. The method as claimed in claim 6 or 7, wherein the said set of narrow parallel finger lines and the wide collector lines are made with conventional silver paste. 8. Solar cells obtained by the method as claimed in any of the preceding claims wherein the finger lines are thick and narrow lines overlapped by the collector lines. 9. A method of manufacturing a solar cell having a top contact pattern substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to the accompanying drawings.

Documents:

208-del-1996-abstract.pdf

208-del-1996-claims.pdf

208-del-1996-complete specification (granted).pdf

208-del-1996-correspondence-others.pdf

208-del-1996-correspondence-po.pdf

208-del-1996-description (complete).pdf

208-del-1996-drawings.pdf

208-del-1996-form-1.pdf

208-del-1996-form-13.pdf

208-del-1996-form-2.pdf

208-del-1996-form-3.pdf

208-del-1996-form-4.pdf

208-del-1996-form-9.pdf

208-del-1996-gpa.pdf

208-del-1996-petition-124.pdf

208-del-1996-petition-137.pdf

208-del-1996-petition-138.pdf

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