Spiers Memorial Lecture: Next generation chalcogenide-based absorbers for thin-film solar cells

Mitzi, David B.; Kim, Y.

doi:10.1039/d2fd00132b

Cited by 19 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 149 publications

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“…In the search of wide bandgap photoabsorbers that are process compatible for fabrication on lower bandgap photoabsorbers, the elemental p-type semiconductor selenium is experiencing renewed interest. [1][2][3][4][5][6] With a reported direct bandgap between 1.8 and 2.0 eV in its trigonal phase and a range of processing temperatures below its melting point of 220 °C, it is an attractive candidate for a top cell in monolithic tandem photovoltaic devices. 7,8 A power conversion efficiency of 5.0% for a singlejunction selenium cell was achieved in the 1980's.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Origin of photovoltaic losses in selenium solar cells with open-circuit voltages approaching 1 V

Nielsen¹,

Youngman

Moustafa

et al. 2022

J. Mater. Chem. A

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Origin of photovoltaic losses in selenium solar cells with open-circuit voltages approaching 1 V

Nielsen¹,

Youngman

Moustafa

et al. 2022

J. Mater. Chem. A

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“…Photovoltaics (PV) is considered an attractive renewable energy technology of key importance in the mitigation of climate change . While silicon solar cells have been dominating the global PV market for decades, a family of inorganic thin-film PV materials has emerged in recent years. , Thin-film PV offers a compelling pathway toward cost-competitive alternatives to silicon solar cells as well as complementary materials for use in tandem devices. , Among these emerging inorganic materials, selenium is a particularly promising candidate due to its single element composition, low melting point, and direct bandgap between 1.8 and 2.0 eV, depending on the synthesis conditions, making it suitable for integration with lower bandgap photovoltaic devices. − However, despite recent advances in the device architecture improving the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of selenium thin-film solar cells from 5.0 to 6.5%, the PCE is still too low for tandem integration to be viable.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Laser-Annealing and Solid-Phase Epitaxy of Selenium Thin-Film Solar Cells

Nielsen,

Hemmingsen,

Bonczyk

et al. 2023

ACS Appl. Energy Mater.

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Selenium has resurged as a promising photovoltaic material in solar cell research due to its wide direct bandgap of 1.95 eV, making it a suitable candidate for a top cell in tandem photovoltaic devices. However, the optoelectronic quality of selenium thin-films has been identified as a key bottleneck for realizing high-efficiency selenium solar cells. In this study, we present an approach for crystallizing selenium thin-films using laser-annealing as an alternative to the conventionally used thermal annealing strategy. By laser-annealing through a semitransparent substrate, a buried layer of high-quality selenium crystallites is formed and used as a growth template for solid-phase epitaxy. The resulting selenium thin-films feature larger and more preferentially oriented grains with a negligible surface roughness in comparison to thermally annealed selenium thin-films. We fabricate photovoltaic devices using this strategy and demonstrate a record ideality factor of n = 1.37, a record fill factor of FF = 63.7%, and a power conversion efficiency of PCE = 5.0%. The presented laser-annealing strategy is universally applicable and is a promising approach for crystallizing a wide range of photovoltaic materials where high temperatures are needed while maintaining a low substrate temperature.

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“…Selective doping with transition-metal cations such as copper and manganese in the host lattice is utilized for introducing dopant ion-related emission, in addition to excitonic property tuning of the host lattice through defect formation . This optical property modulation of the LSPR energy position and bandwidth simultaneously resulting in the enhanced light–matter interactions and tunable optical properties offer a variety of potential applications, including in optoelectronics, photocatalysis, and sensing energy storage and thermoelectrics . In addition, such nanomaterials have remarkable ionic properties tunable through vacancies, , composition, etc.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Mechanistic Insights into Copper(I) and Copper(II) Cation Exchange Reactions in CdSe Nanoplatelets

Banerjee,

Filatov,

Zuo

et al. 2023

Chem. Mater.

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In this study, we investigated the synthesis of copper selenide nanoplatelets (NPLs) through a cation exchange reaction (CER) in 5-monolayer-thick CdSe NPLs using Cu(I) and Cu(II) precursors. We discovered that the exposure of CdSe NPLs to a Cu(I) precursor led to the transformation of NPLs into Cu2–x Se while maintaining their nanoplatelet morphology. The replacement of Cd(II) with Cu(I) prevailed over the formation of doped structures. In the case of the Cu(II) precursor, we observed that Cu(II) was first reduced to Cu(I) before being intercalated into the host lattice, resulting in the synthesis of Cu2–x Se, similar to CER with Cu(I) precursors but without preservation of the initial morphology of NPLs. Interestingly, the presence of oxygen was found to facilitate the cation exchange processes in CdSe NPLs, whereas a nitrogen atmosphere suppressed the CER. Despite the similar ionic sizes of Cu(I) and Cu(II), the substitution of Cd(II) with Cu(II) was found to be challenging, possibly due to the involvement of redox processes resulting in the significant deterioration of initial CdSe NPLs. We demonstrate that CER can achieve near-complete substitution of cadmium atoms with monovalent copper at room temperature. Understanding the processes involved in CERs is crucial for engineering more complex structures, such as high-entropy nanoparticles involving cation exchange with different oxidation states and development of material synthesis using machine learning and artificial intelligence approaches.

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Spiers Memorial Lecture: Next generation chalcogenide-based absorbers for thin-film solar cells

Abstract: The lecture focuses on emerging chalcogenide-based thin-film photovoltaics and provides both an overview of selected absorber candidates that are of recent interest, and a deeper dive into an exemplary Cu2BaSn(S,Se)4-related family.

Cited by 19 publications

References 149 publications

Origin of photovoltaic losses in selenium solar cells with open-circuit voltages approaching 1 V

Origin of photovoltaic losses in selenium solar cells with open-circuit voltages approaching 1 V

Laser-Annealing and Solid-Phase Epitaxy of Selenium Thin-Film Solar Cells

Mechanistic Insights into Copper(I) and Copper(II) Cation Exchange Reactions in CdSe Nanoplatelets

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