Fill factor

Fill factor in the context of solar cell technology it is defined as the ratio (given as percent) of the actual maximum obtainable power, (V_mp x J_mp) to the theoretical (not actually obtainable) power, (J_sc x V_oc).

$FF = \frac{P_{m}}{V_{oc} \times I_{sc}} = \frac{\eta \times A_c \times E}{V_{oc} \times I_{sc}}$

The open circuit voltage (V_oc) is the maximum voltage, when the circuit resistance has caused any current to cease flowing.
The short circuit current density (J_sc) is the maximum current through the circuit when there is no resistance (and hence no voltage).
The fill factor (FF), is thus defined as (V_mpJ_mp)/(V_ocI_sc), where J_mp and V_mp represent the current density and voltage at the maximum power point, this point being obtained by varying the resistance in the circuit until J x V is at it's greatest value.

Other uses of the term

In vision science, the fill factor is the ratio of view areas to the object visible areas.

For optical micro-lens arrays, the fill factor is defined as the ratio of the active refracting area to the total contiguous area occupied by the lens array.

This physics-related article is a stub. You can help Wikipedia by expanding it.

Why are we here?
All text is available under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License
This page is cache of Wikipedia. History