Improvement in stability and exploring the photovoltaic properties of CsPbI2Br thin films for perovskite solar cells

Abstract

The phase stability and quality of CsPbI2Br perovskite film directly determines the performance of perovskite solar cells (PSCs). However, there is a lack of research on phase stability of perovskite films of PSCs. Here, by simply controlling precursors with specified ratios and solvents, the phase stability, charge transfer resistance and electron lifetime improve significantly which is useful for high performance in perovskite solar cells. Besides this, the information about trap centres by a novel technique Charge Deep Level Transient Spectroscopy (Q-DLTS) also helps to improve efficiency of perovskite solar cells. In this work, CsPbI2Br perovskite thin films have been synthesized using simple solution processing method, by varying CsBr and PbI2 precursors with specified ratios of 1.05 M:1 M and 1.10 M:1 M in Dimethysulfoxide (DMSO) and Dimethyl formamide (DMF). The CsPbI2Br film with ratio of 1.05:1 has more phase stability in ambient air at room temperature than that of 1.10:1. Drop casting method was adopted for thin films preparation and structurally cubic phase of perovskite films obtained by X-ray diffraction (XRD). Scanning electron microscope (SEM) showed more homogeneity on the surface of the sample with ratio 1.05:1 and energy dispersive x-ray spectroscopy (EDX) confirmed the presence of same amounts in chemical composition. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) transmittance spectra showed that main peak is generally observed because of stretching vibrations of lead-iodide ions. In UV–visible (UV-Vis) little effect was observed on the energy band gaps i.e. 1.93 eV for 1.05 M:1 M and 1.96 eV for 1.10 M:1 M. The electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) measurements were performed for electronic charges accumulation on the surface of the films which showed semi-circles Nyquist plots and frequency dependent Bode plots were used to find electron lifetime. The charge transfer resistance (Rct) decreased from 52Ω to 45Ω and electron life time were approximately equal to 0.10 s and 0.09 s for the ratio of 1.10:1 and 1.05:1. I-V measurements showed an Ohmic contact formation providing insights into defect concentrations with a linear response to applied bias. Recombination lifetimes were investigated using transient photovoltage (TPV) at various biases, no correlation between the applied bias and recombination lifetime was found. Q-DLTS indicated presence of 3 trap centers for the charge carriers which were actively responsible for degradation of the perovskite material, these traps serve as recombination centres that reduce the overall power conversion efficiency (PCE) of solar cells. Photoluminescence spectroscopy (PL) analysis was done to verify the energy bandgap value which was found similar in comparison to UV–VIS.