IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natcom/v10y2019i1d10.1038_s41467-019-10985-5.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Atomic-level passivation mechanism of ammonium salts enabling highly efficient perovskite solar cells

Author

Listed:
  • Essa A. Alharbi

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Ahmed Y. Alyamani

    (King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology)

  • Dominik J. Kubicki

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne
    Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Alexander R. Uhl

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne
    The University of British Columbia)

  • Brennan J. Walder

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Anwar Q. Alanazi

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Jingshan Luo

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne
    Nankai University)

  • Andrés Burgos-Caminal

    (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Abdulrahman Albadri

    (King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology)

  • Hamad Albrithen

    (King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology
    King Saud University)

  • Mohammad Hayal Alotaibi

    (King Abdulaziz City for Science and Technology)

  • Jacques-E. Moser

    (École polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Shaik M. Zakeeruddin

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Fabrizio Giordano

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Lyndon Emsley

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

  • Michael Grätzel

    (Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne)

Abstract

The high conversion efficiency has made metal halide perovskite solar cells a real breakthrough in thin film photovoltaic technology in recent years. Here, we introduce a straightforward strategy to reduce the level of electronic defects present at the interface between the perovskite film and the hole transport layer by treating the perovskite surface with different types of ammonium salts, namely ethylammonium, imidazolium and guanidinium iodide. We use a triple cation perovskite formulation containing primarily formamidinium and small amounts of cesium and methylammonium. We find that this treatment boosts the power conversion efficiency from 20.5% for the control to 22.3%, 22.1%, and 21.0% for the devices treated with ethylammonium, imidazolium and guanidinium iodide, respectively. Best performing devices showed a loss in efficiency of only 5% under full sunlight intensity with maximum power tracking for 550 h. We apply 2D- solid-state NMR to unravel the atomic-level mechanism of this passivation effect.

Suggested Citation

  • Essa A. Alharbi & Ahmed Y. Alyamani & Dominik J. Kubicki & Alexander R. Uhl & Brennan J. Walder & Anwar Q. Alanazi & Jingshan Luo & Andrés Burgos-Caminal & Abdulrahman Albadri & Hamad Albrithen & Moha, 2019. "Atomic-level passivation mechanism of ammonium salts enabling highly efficient perovskite solar cells," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 10(1), pages 1-9, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:10:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-019-10985-5
    DOI: 10.1038/s41467-019-10985-5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-019-10985-5
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41467-019-10985-5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Haodong Wu & Yuchen Hou & Jungjin Yoon & Abbey Marie Knoepfel & Luyao Zheng & Dong Yang & Ke Wang & Jin Qian & Shashank Priya & Kai Wang, 2024. "Down-selection of biomolecules to assemble “reverse micelle” with perovskites," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-14, December.
    2. Shariatinia, Zahra, 2020. "Recent progress in development of diverse kinds of hole transport materials for the perovskite solar cells: A review," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 119(C).
    3. Jing Liu & Peilin Liu & Tailong Shi & Mo Ke & Kao Xiong & Yuxuan Liu & Long Chen & Linxiang Zhang & Xinyi Liang & Hao Li & Shuaicheng Lu & Xinzheng Lan & Guangda Niu & Jianbing Zhang & Peng Fei & Lian, 2023. "Flexible and broadband colloidal quantum dots photodiode array for pixel-level X-ray to near-infrared image fusion," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-9, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natcom:v:10:y:2019:i:1:d:10.1038_s41467-019-10985-5. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.