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Research Article

Work function engineering to enhance open-circuit voltage in planar perovskite solar cells by g-C3N4 nanosheets

Jian Yang1,2, Liang Chu1( ), Ruiyuan Hu1, Wei Liu1, Nanjing Liu1, Yuhui Ma1, Waqar Ahmad3, Xing’ao Li1( )
Institute of Advanced Materials & New Energy Technology Engineering Laboratory of Jiangsu Province & School of Materials Science and Engineering & School of Science, Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications, Nanjing 210023, China
Department of Mathematics and Physics, Nanjing Institute of Technology, Nanjing 211167, China
Department of Physics, Government College Women University, Kutchery Road, Sialkot 51310, Pakistan
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Graphical Abstract

Abstract

Enhancement of open-circuit voltage (Voc) is an effective way to improve power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the perovskite solar cells (PSCs). Theoretically, work function engineering of TiO2 electron transport layer can reduce both the loss of Voc and current hysteresis in PSCs. In this work, two-dimensional g-C3N4 nanosheets were adopted to modify the compact TiO2 layers in planar PSCs, which can finely tune the work function (WF) and further improve the energy level alignment at the interface to enhance the Voc and diminish the hysteresis. Meanwhile, the quality of perovskite films and charge transfer of the devices were improved by g-C3N4 nanosheets. Therefore, the PCE of the planar PSCs was champed to 19.55% without obvious hysteresis compared with the initial 15.81%, mainly owing to the remarkable improvement of VOC from 1.01 to 1.11 V. In addition, the stability of the devices was obviously improved. The results demonstrate an effective strategy of WF engineering to enhance Voc and diminish hysteresis phenomenon for improving the performance of PSCs.

Keywords

perovskite solar cellspower conversion efficiencyopen-circuit voltageg-C3N4 nanosheetswork function engineering

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Nano Research
Volume 14 Issue 7,
July 2021
Pages 2139-2144
DOI: 10.1007/s12274-021-3408-x
Cite this article:
Yang J, Chu L, Hu R, et al. Work function engineering to enhance open-circuit voltage in planar perovskite solar cells by g-C3N4 nanosheets. Nano Research, 2021, 14(7): 2139-2144. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-021-3408-x
Topics:
Perovskite solar cells

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Received: 23 December 2020
Revised: 15 February 2021
Accepted: 18 February 2021
Published: 05 July 2021
© Tsinghua University Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2021
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