Hybrid Mesoporous TiO2/ZnO Electron Transport Layer for Efficient Perovskite Solar Cell

Aleksandra Drygała; Zbigniew Starowicz; Katarzyna Gawlińska-Nęcek; Małgorzata Karolus; Marek Lipiński; Paweł Jarka; Wiktor Matysiak; Eva Tillová; Peter Palček; Tomasz Tański

doi:10.3390/molecules28155656

Hybrid Mesoporous TiO₂/ZnO Electron Transport Layer for Efficient Perovskite Solar Cell

Molecules. 2023 Jul 26;28(15):5656. doi: 10.3390/molecules28155656.

Affiliations

¹ Department of Engineering Materials and Biomaterials, Silesian University of Technology, Konarskiego 18a Street, 44-100 Gliwice, Poland.
² Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science, Polish Academy of Sciences, Reymonta 25 Street, 30-059 Cracow, Poland.
³ Institute of Materials Engineering, University of Silesia, 1a 75 Pułku Piechoty Street, 41-500 Chorzow, Poland.
⁴ Scientific and Didactic Laboratory of Nanotechnology and Material Technologies, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, Silesian University of Technology, Towarowa 7 Street, 44-100 Gliwice, Poland.
⁵ Department of Materials Engineering, Faculty of Mechanical Engineering, University of Žilina, Univerzitná 1 Street, 010 26 Zilina, Slovakia.

Abstract

In recent years, perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have gained major attention as potentially useful photovoltaic technology due to their ever-increasing power-conversion efficiency (PCE). The efficiency of PSCs depends strongly on the type of materials selected as the electron transport layer (ETL). TiO₂ is the most widely used electron transport material for the n-i-p structure of PSCs. Nevertheless, ZnO is a promising candidate owing to its high transparency, suitable energy band structure, and high electron mobility. In this investigation, hybrid mesoporous TiO₂/ZnO ETL was fabricated for a perovskite solar cell composed of FTO-coated glass/compact TiO₂/mesoporous ETL/FAPbI₃/2D perovskite/Spiro-OMeTAD/Au. The influence of ZnO nanostructures with different percentage weight contents on the photovoltaic performance was investigated. It was found that the addition of ZnO had no significant effect on the surface topography, structure, and optical properties of the hybrid mesoporous electron-transport layer but strongly affected the electrical properties of PSCs. The best efficiency rate of 18.24% has been obtained for PSCs with 2 wt.% ZnO.

Keywords: electron transport layer; nanostructures; perovskite solar cell; photovoltaics.

Grants and funding

This publication was supported under the Initiative of Excellence—Research University program implemented at the Silesian University of Technology, Poland, 2021–2023. The experiments were executed with the cooperation of M. Lipiński et al. from the Photovoltaic Laboratory of the Institute of Metallurgy and Materials Science of the Polish Academy of Sciences within the statutory work Z-2/2023 and grant no. 2018/31/B/ST8/03294 supported by the National Science Centre of Poland.