Solution

ID: past-exam-of-the-mphil-in-micro-and-nanotechnology-enterprise-course-of-the-university-of-cambridge/2022/paper-1/section-b/9/i/a/solution

Use anisotropic alkaline wet etching of a suitably oriented crystalline silicon wafer. A KOH- or TMAH-based process etches crystallographic planes at different rates, leaving slow-etching facets as a pyramidal texture on a wafer. The facets redirect reflected light towards neighbouring surfaces, increasing the chance of absorption rather than specular escape.
Choose conditions that give a uniform texture without excessive removal or contamination, and clean the wafer before forming the junction. This mechanism depends on crystallinity: a multicrystalline or differently oriented wafer may need another texture process. The drawing alone does not establish the wafer orientation, so the standard pyramidal-texture method carries that explicit assumption.

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