The growing interest in using thinner wafers (<200 mu m) requires the development of low temperature passivation strategies for the back contact of heterojunction solar cells. In this work, we investigate low temperature deposited back contacts based on boron-doped amorphous silicon films obtained by Hot-Wire CVD. The influence of the deposition parameters and the use of an intrinsic buffer layer have been considered. The microstructure of the deposited thin films has been comprehensively studied by Spectroscopic Ellipsometry in the UV-visible range. The effective recombination velocity at the back surface has been measured by the Quasi-Steady-State Photoconductance technique. Complete double-side heterojunction solar cells (1 cm(2)) have been fabricated and characterized by External Quantum Efficiency and current-voltage measurements. Total-area conversion efficiencies up to 14.5% were achieved in a fully low temperature process (<200 degrees C). (c) 2007 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.