Li-Doped SnO₂ Electron Transport Layer for High-Performance Perovskite Solar Cell Fabricated Using Magnetic Field-Assisted Electrodeposition

Abstract

One of the key challenges for the development of perovskite solar cells lies in the approach toward large-scale fabrication of the active materials that allows for good photovoltaic performance, as well as facile handling. The electrodeposition technique can potentially address such requirements. However, the technique has yet to be investigated in detail and still suffers from low efficiency of the device. In this study, we sought to significantly upgrade the electrodeposition approach by coupling the technique with an external magnetic field in the preparation of high-quality PbI2 precursor layer and using Li-doped SnO2 electron transport layer. Our results showed that the magnetic field-assisted electrodeposition yielded good crystallinity of PbI2 and perovskite. Introducing the Li-doped mesoporous SnO2 into the device structure resulted in a higher current density of 18.50–18.80 mA cm-2, which can be attributed to, based on the linear sweep voltammetry, reduced resistance of the electron transport layer from 32.27 to 22.11 Ω cm-2. Moreover, the carbon-based device prepared using this simple procedure also yielded 5.20% in photoconversion efficiency for 1-cm2 active area and 0.45% for 25-cm2 active area, all without any significant hysteresis.