Low-Temperature Processed TiOx Electron Transport Layer for Efficient Planar Perovskite Solar Cells

Md Shahiduzzaman; Daiki Kuwahara; Masahiro Nakano; Makoto Karakawa; Kohshin Takahashi; Jean-Michel Nunzi; Tetsuya Taima

doi:10.3390/nano10091676

Low-Temperature Processed TiO_x Electron Transport Layer for Efficient Planar Perovskite Solar Cells

Nanomaterials (Basel). 2020 Aug 26;10(9):1676. doi: 10.3390/nano10091676.

Authors

Md Shahiduzzaman¹, Daiki Kuwahara², Masahiro Nakano², Makoto Karakawa^{1

2

3}, Kohshin Takahashi², Jean-Michel Nunzi^{1

4}, Tetsuya Taima^{1

2

3}

Affiliations

¹ Nanomaterials Research Institute, Kanazawa University, Kakuma, Kanazawa 920-1192, Japan.
² Graduate School of Natural Science and Technology, Kanazawa University, Kakuma, Kanazawa 920-1192, Japan.
³ Graduate School of Frontier Science Initiative, Kanazawa University, Kakuma, Kanazawa 920-1192, Japan.
⁴ Department of Physics, Engineering Physics and Astronomy, Queen's University, Kingston, ON K7L 3N6, Canada.

Abstract

The most frequently used n-type electron transport layer (ETL) in high-efficiency perovskite solar cells (PSCs) is based on titanium oxide (TiO₂) films, involving a high-temperature sintering (>450 °C) process. In this work, a dense, uniform, and pinhole-free compact titanium dioxide (TiO_x) film was prepared via a facile chemical bath deposition process at a low temperature (80 °C), and was applied as a high-quality ETL for efficient planar PSCs. We tested and compared as-deposited substrates sintered at low temperatures (< 150 °C) and high temperatures (> 450 °C), as well as their corresponding photovoltaic properties. PSCs with a high-temperature treated TiO₂ compact layer (CL) exhibited power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) as high as 15.50%, which was close to those of PSCs with low-temperature treated TiO_x (14.51%). This indicates that low-temperature treated TiO_x can be a potential ETL candidate for planar PSCs. In summary, this work reports on the fabrication of low-temperature processed PSCs, and can be of interest for the design and fabrication of future low-cost and flexible solar modules.

Keywords: high-temperature TiO2 layer; low-temperature TiOx layer; perovskite solar cells.