NOVELTY - Doping a surface region of a semiconductor material on a surface of a semiconductor device during its manufacture, the surface region of the semiconductor material being coated with a dielectric material surface layer and the doping being performed in one or more localized regions, the method comprises locally heating the surface of the semiconductor material in an area to be doped to locally melt the semiconductor material, the melting being performed in the presence of a dopant source.    USE - The methods and multi-layer anti-reflection coating are useful for doping a surface region of a semiconductor material on a surface of a semiconductor device during its manufacture; and for fabricating a multi-layer anti-reflection coating for a solar cell (all claimed).    ADVANTAGE - The methods provide a high performance solar cell technology, simple and has low cost process.    DETAILED DESCRIPTION - Doping a surface region of a semiconductor material on a surface of a semiconductor device during its manufacture, the surface region of the semiconductor material being coated with a dielectric material surface layer and the doping being performed in one or more localized regions, the method comprises locally heating the surface of the semiconductor material in an area to be doped to locally melt the semiconductor material, the melting being performed in the presence of a dopant source where dopant from the dopant source is absorbed into the molten semiconductor and where the heating is performed in a controlled manner such that a region of the surface of the semiconductor material in the area to be doped is maintained in a molten state without refreezing for a period of time greater than one microsecond. INDEPENDENT CLAIMS are:    (1) a multi-layer anti-reflection coating for a solar cell where the solar cell includes a semiconductor material structure in which a junction is formed, the anti- reflection coating being located on a light receiving surface of the semiconductor material structure and comprising a thin layer of thermal expansion mismatch correction material having a thermal expansion coefficient less than or equal to that of the semiconductor material, to provide thermal expansion coefficient mismatch correction; and an anti-reflection layer having a refractive index and thickness selected to match the semiconductor material structure so as to give good overall antireflection properties to the solar cell; and    (2) a method of fabricating a multi-layer anti-reflection coating for a solar cell where the solar cell includes a semiconductor material structure in which a junction is formed, the anti-reflection coating being formed on a light receiving surface of the semiconductor material structure and the method comprising forming a thin layer of thermal expansion mismatch correction material having a thermal expansion coefficient less than or equal to that of the semiconductor material, to provide thermal expansion coefficient mismatch correction; and forming an anti-reflection layer under or over the thermal expansion mismatch correction material, the anti-reflection layer being selected to have a refractive index and thickness which matches the anti-reflection layer to the semiconductor material structure so as to give good overall antireflection properties to the solar cell.