Thermally Stable Mesoporous Perovskite Solar Cells Incorporating Low-Temperature Processed Graphene/Polymer Electron Transporting Layer

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2016 Nov 2;8(43):29496-29503. doi: 10.1021/acsami.6b10278. Epub 2016 Oct 24.

Abstract

In the short time since its discovery, perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have attained high power conversion efficiency but their lack of thermal stability remains a barrier to commercialization. Among the experimentally accessible parameter spaces for optimizing performance, identifying an electron transport layer (ETL) that forms a thermally stable interface with perovskite and which is solution-processable at low-temperature will certainly be advantageous. Herein, we developed a mesoporous graphene/polymer composite with these advantages when used as ETL in CH3NH3PbI3 PSCs, and a high efficiency of 13.8% under AM 1.5G solar illumination could be obtained. Due to the high heat transmission coefficient and low isoelectric point of mesoporous graphene-based ETL, the PSC device enjoys good chemical and thermal stability. Our work demonstrates that the mesoporous graphene-based scaffold is a promising ETL candidate for high performance and thermally stable PSCs.

Keywords: electron transport layer; graphene; low temperature; mesoporous; perovskite solar cells; polymer.