² Department of Multidisciplinary Engineering, The NorthCap University, Gurugram, India;

³ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Ramdeobaba University, Nagpur 440013, India;

⁴ Department of Safety and Fire Engineering, K.S.R. College of Engineering, Tiruchengode, Tamil Nadu, India;

⁵ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Erode Sengunthar Engineering College, Perundurai 638057, India;

⁶ Department of Computer Science Engineering, Koneru Lakshmaiah Education Foundation, Guntur 522302, India;

⁷ Department of Physics, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel College, Bhabhua, Kaimur, Bihar 821101, India;

⁸ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Adithya Institute of Technology, Coimbatore 641107, India;

⁹ Department of Mechanical Engineering, Saveetha School of Engineering, Saveetha Institute of Medical and Technical Sciences (SIMATS), Saveetha University, Chennai 602105, Tamil Nadu, India.

* Correspondence: karthiksamynathan@gmail.com

For the current global energy demand, the solar based energy resource was found to be long term, consistent and renewable in nature. Present research work mainly focusses on improving the energy conversion rate of polycrystalline silicon solar cell through antireflective thin films. Polycrystalline silicon solar cell is found to be one of the predominant energy resources for the easier conversion and utilisation of incident light energy into electrical energy. The materials such as zinc oxide (ZnO) and silicon nitride (Si₃N₄) were found to be the excellent antireflection property which hinders the light reflectance. The solar cell was coated with ZnO, Si₃N₄ and ZnO- Si₃N₄ through electrospraying technique. The coated solar cell films were inspected through optical, electrical, structural, elemental and morphological studies. ZnO- Si₃N₄ coated solar cell exert a maximum power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 21.78 % in the controlled light source environment. However, the mechanical blends were found to have higher impact in trapping incident light over the coated surface than the individual material coatings.