Materials presently in use for photovoltaics include mono-crystallinesilicon (used in manufacturing of high performance solar cells that are more expensive to produce than their polysilicon counterparts), polycrystalline silicon(material consisting of small silicon crystallites converted into
a single solar grade silicon), amorphous silicon (non-crystalline allotropic form of silicon; deposited in thin
films at low temperatures onto a variety of surfaces, providing unique capabilities for various electronic devices), copper indium sulfide and cadmium telluride (usually conjoined together with cadmium sulfide to form a p-n junction PV solar cell).
Here are a couple of videos for you to better understand the process:
