Abstract
Abstract Solution-processing thin-film solar techniques, such as organic solar cells (OSCs) and perovskite solar cells (PeSCs), hold great promise as cost-effective renewable energy sources with feasible large-scale manufacturing. However, these devices are suffering from the incomplete photon absorption and thereby cannot unlock the full potential of device efficiency despite their rapid development in recent decades. Incorporation of plasmonic metal nanoparticles (NPs) into the thin active layers has been considered as a breakthrough strategy to solve this inherent limit and represent an imperative milestone toward the highly efficient OSCs and PeSCs, arising from the significantly enhanced light absorption and electrical characteristics in fundamental. Herein, the recent advances in fabrication and incorporation strategies of plasmonic NPs are reviewed. The in-depth efficiency and stability enhancement mechanisms are investigated and highlighted. Meanwhile, potential strategies and perspectives for their further development of NP-based solution-processing OSCs and PeSCs are presented.
Highlights
The ongoing energy crisis combined with global warming and air pollution in recent decades induced with traditional fossil fuel has indicated the urgent requirement for the development of cost-effective, feasible, and largescale manufacture; environmental stability; and green energy technologies
The power conversation efficiencies (PCEs) of single-junction and tandemjunction organic solar cells (OSCs) have been significantly improved to 17.3% [31] and 16.35% [32], respectively, whereas the PCE of perovskite solar cells (PeSCs) has reached to a relatively high value of 25.2% certified by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) [https://www.nrel.gov/pv/cell-efficiency.html], matched to the Si-based solar cells
We address the characteristics of metal NPs and their applications in highly efficient OSCs and PeSCs
Summary
The ongoing energy crisis combined with global warming and air pollution in recent decades induced with traditional fossil fuel has indicated the urgent requirement for the development of cost-effective, feasible, and largescale manufacture; environmental stability; and green energy technologies. The photoactive layers, namely, conjugated polymers or fullerene derivatives, in OSCs are commonly very thin with the order of 100 nm to trade off the low exciton collection rate induced by short diffusion length [35, 36] In this case, effective approaches should be explored to maximize the light harvesting across the solar spectrum range and achieve high PCEs with the reduced absorber thickness [37, 38]. Metal NPs can substantially enhance the optical absorption of devices without influencing the device architecture due to the excitation of localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) and the far-field light scattering effect [48,49,50] They have been investigated to enhance the electrical characteristics, including exciton dissociation, charge transport, and collection in devices [51,52,53,54]. We develop the evolution of device performance and the application of plasmonic NP–based OSCs and PeSCs and investigate the underlying enhancement mechanisms, as well as the future outlook in our perspective
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