Patent ID: 7759220

Claim:
A method for fabricating a photovoltaic cell, the method comprising: providing a reusable substrate having a surface region, a cleave region, and a total thickness of material, the total thickness of material being at least N times greater than a first thickness of material to be removed, the first thickness of material to be removed being between the surface region and the cleave region; coupling the surface region of the reusable substrate to a first surface region of an optically transparent substrate, the optically transparent substrate comprising the first surface region and a second surface region; contacting a first electrode to a first region of the reusable substrate, and contacting a second electrode to a second region of the reusable substrate; and providing a first voltage through the first electrode at the first region and a second voltage through the second electrode at the second region of the reusable substrate to create a voltage differential across the first and second regions to cause an increase in energy at one or more portions of the cleave region to facilitate removal of the first thickness of material from the reusable substrate, while the surface region remains coupled to the first surface region, to form a cleaved surface region coupled to the first surface region of the optically transparent substrate.