Proceedings of International Conference on Hybrid and Organic Photovoltaics (HOPV16)
Publication date: 28th March 2016
Organometal halide perovskite solar cells are currently of great interest due to their excellent light absorption ability and high charge mobility. Since being employed as the light absorber in Dye Sensitized Solar Cells(DSSCs), the efficiency of organometal halide perovskites based solar cell have increased to 21% in recent years.1 However, despite all the effort to improve the cell performance, the majority of studies have looked at ways of controlling the crystallization process of the perovskite layer, while very few studies have focused on surface engineering of the blocking layer, especially TiO2.2In this work, a group of perylene diimide derivatives (PDIs) and benzoic acids with different functional groups have been used to modify the surface of the compact TiO2 layer in planar perovskite solar cells, and it is demonstrated that the hysteresis of the cells was reduced and the stability was improved when compared with cells without interface engineering. In addition, an improvement of VOC was observed when small molecules with appropriate dipole moments were used. In all these small molecules, a carboxyl group makes them anchor the TiO2 surface easily, and an electron donating group enables the modification of work function3, which is beneficial to charge collection. Furthermore, the morphology of the perovskite layer can be controlled as the adsorbed layer changes the wetting properties of TiO2 layer.
1. N. chart, http://www.nrel.gov/ncpv/images/efficiency_chart.jpg,.
2. W. Li, W. Zhang, S. Van Reenen, R. J. Sutton, J. Fan, A. A. Haghighirad, M. B. Johnston, L. Wang and H. J. Snaith, Energy & Environmental Science, 2016, 9, 490-498.
3. J. Krüger, U. Bach and M. Grätzel, Advanced Materials, 2000, 12, 447-451.