A-P. Thilakan, J-X. Li, T-P. Chen, S-S. Li, C-W. Chen, M. Osada, K. Tsukagoshi, T. Sasaki, A. Yabushita, K-H. Wu, C-W. Luo ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces 11 (24), 21473-21480 (2019)
Abstract
The inherent instability of UV-induced degradation in TiO2-based perovskite solar cells was largely improved by replacing the anatase-phase compact TiO2 layer with an atomic sheet transport layer (ASTL) of two-dimensional (2D) Ti1−δO2. The vital role of microscopic carrier dynamics that govern the UV stability of perovskite solar cells was comprehensively examined in this work by performing time-resolved pump–probe spectroscopy. In conventional perovskite solar cells, the presence of a UV-active oxygen vacancy in compact TiO2 prohibits current generation by heavily trapping electrons after UV degradation. Conversely, the dominant vacancy type in the 2D Ti1−δO2 ASTL is a titanium vacancy, which is a shallow acceptor and is not UV-sensitive. Therefore, it significantly suppresses carrier recombination and extends UV stability in perovskite solar cells with a 2D Ti1−δO2 ASTL. Other carrier dynamics, such as electron diffusion, electron injection, and hot hole transfer processes, were found to be less affected by UV irradiation. Quantitative pump–probe data clearly show a correlation between the carrier dynamics and UV aging of perovskite solar cells, thus providing a profound insight into the factors driving UV-induced degradation in perovskite solar cells and the origin of its performance.