Efficient CdTe Nanocrystal/TiO2 Hetero-Junction Solar Cells with Open Circuit Voltage Breaking 0.8 V by Incorporating A Thin Layer of CdS Nanocrystal

Institute of Polymer Optoelectronic Materials & Devices, State Key Laboratory of Luminescent Materials & Devices, South China University of Technology, Guangzhou 510640, China

Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Optical Fiber Sensing and Communications, Guangzhou Key Laboratory of Vacuum Coating Technologies and New Energy Materials, Siyuan Laboratory, Department of Physics, Jinan University, Guangzhou 510632, China

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Nanomaterials 2018, 8(8), 614; https://doi.org/10.3390/nano8080614

Received: 22 July 2018 / Revised: 10 August 2018 / Accepted: 10 August 2018 / Published: 13 August 2018

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Emerging Solar Cells)

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Abstract

Nanocrystal solar cells (NCs) allow for large scale solution processing under ambient conditions, permitting a promising approach for low-cost photovoltaic products. Although an up to 10% power conversion efficiency (PCE) has been realized with the development of device fabrication technologies, the open circuit voltage (V_oc) of CdTe NC solar cells has stagnated below 0.7 V, which is significantly lower than most CdTe thin film solar cells fabricated by vacuum technology (around 0.8 V~0.9 V). To further improve the NC solar cells’ performance, an enhancement in the V_oc towards 0.8–1.0 V is urgently required. Given the unique processing technologies and physical properties in CdTe NC, the design of an optimized band alignment and improved junction quality are important issues to obtain efficient solar cells coupled with high V_oc. In this work, an efficient method was developed to improve the performance and V_oc of solution-processed CdTe nanocrystal/TiO₂ hetero-junction solar cells. A thin layer of solution-processed CdS NC film (~5 nm) as introduced into CdTe NC/TiO₂ to construct hetero-junction solar cells with an optimized band alignment and p-n junction quality, which resulted in a low dark current density and reduced carrier recombination. As a result, devices with improved performance (5.16% compared to 2.63% for the control device) and a V_oc as high as 0.83 V were obtained; this V_oc value is a record for a solution-processed CdTe NC solar cell. View Full-Text

Keywords: nanocrystal; CdTe; TiO₂; CdS; solar cells; solution processed

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MDPI and ACS Style

Mei, X.; Wu, B.; Guo, X.; Liu, X.; Rong, Z.; Liu, S.; Chen, Y.; Qin, D.; Xu, W.; Hou, L.; Chen, B. Efficient CdTe Nanocrystal/TiO₂ Hetero-Junction Solar Cells with Open Circuit Voltage Breaking 0.8 V by Incorporating A Thin Layer of CdS Nanocrystal. Nanomaterials 2018, 8, 614. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano8080614

AMA Style

Mei X, Wu B, Guo X, Liu X, Rong Z, Liu S, Chen Y, Qin D, Xu W, Hou L, Chen B. Efficient CdTe Nanocrystal/TiO₂ Hetero-Junction Solar Cells with Open Circuit Voltage Breaking 0.8 V by Incorporating A Thin Layer of CdS Nanocrystal. Nanomaterials. 2018; 8(8):614. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano8080614

Chicago/Turabian Style

Mei, Xianglin, Bin Wu, Xiuzhen Guo, Xiaolin Liu, Zhitao Rong, Songwei Liu, Yanru Chen, Donghuan Qin, Wei Xu, Lintao Hou, and Bingchang Chen. 2018. "Efficient CdTe Nanocrystal/TiO₂ Hetero-Junction Solar Cells with Open Circuit Voltage Breaking 0.8 V by Incorporating A Thin Layer of CdS Nanocrystal" Nanomaterials 8, no. 8: 614. https://doi.org/10.3390/nano8080614

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Efficient CdTe Nanocrystal/TiO₂ Hetero-Junction Solar Cells with Open Circuit Voltage Breaking 0.8 V by Incorporating A Thin Layer of CdS Nanocrystal

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