Alternate Layers Research Articles

First-principles study of anomalous Hall effect and anomalous Nernst effect in Fe2Si

We have performed density functional calculations of the electronic structure, anomalous Hall conductivity, and anomalous Nernst conductivity for the model crystal structure of a mineral Hapkeite Fe2Si contained in a meteorite Dhofar 280, which is believed to originate from the Moon. The calculated results showed that the model structure of Hapkeite Fe2Si exhibits a larger transverse thermoelectric effect than bcc-Fe and hexagonal Fe2Si. Based on the detailed analysis of the electronic structures and transport coefficients, we found that the origin of the large transverse thermoelectric effect is due to an anomaly in the density of states at the interface between the Fe layers and the Si–Fe alternative stacked layers. This finding is promising for the design of new transverse thermoelectric materials.

The effectiveness of a hydrocolloid crusting method versus standard care in the treatment of incontinence-associated dermatitis among adult patients in an acute care setting: A randomised controlled trial

IntroductionIncontinence-associated dermatitis (IAD) is a type of irritant contact dermatitis due to prolonged exposure of the skin to moisture induced by urine or/and faeces. The main principles when treating IAD involves protecting the skin from further exposure to irritants, establishing a healing environment, and eradicating skin infections. This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of the hydrocolloid crusting method (HCM) versus the standard care method (SCM) in treating IAD. MethodA randomised controlled trial was conducted in an acute tertiary hospital in Singapore between August 2019 to September 2021. Using computer-generated numbers, patients were randomised into either HCM or SCM treatment groups. HCM treatment involved cleansing the affected area with a pH-neutral non-rinse moisturising cleanser, and the application of alternate layers of hydrocolloid powder, and non-sting film barrier spray (repeated three times during each use). Patients in the SCM treatment group received the same cleanser followed by a 30% zinc oxide barrier cream. IAD was assessed daily for up to seven days by the wound care nurses using the IAD severity tool. The primary outcome of the study was the mean difference in IAD score per day between both methods. ResultsForty-four patients were eligible and recruited (22 in HCM; 22 in SCM). Patients in both groups were comparable in age and gender. IAD Category 2 was more predominant in both methods. The most common location of IAD was at the perianal skin and diarrhea related to gastroenteritis was the most prevalent cause of IAD. More patients in the SCM group (n = 12; 54.5%) had their IAD healed within seven days compared to HCM, (n = 7; 31.8%) group. However, the average decrease in IAD scores per day for both methods were found to be similar. ConclusionHCM can be considered as a treatment of IAD along with the use of SCM. A skin care regimen should include effective cleansing, skin protection, and moisturization in IAD management.

Exceptional Hydrogen Diffusion Rate over Ru Nanoparticle-Doped Polar MgO(111) Surface.

Hydrogen (H) conductivity on oxide-based materials is crucially important in fuel cells and related catalysis. Here, this work measures the diffusion rate of H generated from Ru nanoparticles loaded on polar MgO(111) facet particles under H2 at elevated temperatures without moisture and compares it to conventional nonpolar MgO(110) for the first time by in situ quasielastic neutron scattering (QENS). The QENS reveals an exceptional diffusion rate on the polar facet via a proton (H+ ) hopping mechanism, which is an order of magnitude superior to that of typical H+ -conducting oxides. This work attributes this to the unique atomic arrangement of alternate layers of Mg cations and O anions of the polar MgO(111) where the strong electrostatic field of terminal oxygen anions facilitates protonic migration with a lower degree of local covalency.

Design and Fabrication of Layered Electromagnetic Interference Shielding Materials: A Cost-Effective Strategy for Performance Prediction and Efficiency Tuning.

The electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding market is one of the fast-growing sectors owing to the increasingly complicated electromagnetic environment. Recently, priority has been given to improvise the techniques to fine-tune and predict the shielding properties of structures without exhausting raw materials and reduce the expense as well as the time required for optimization. In this article, we demonstrate an effective and precise method to predict the EMI shielding effectiveness (SE) of materials via simulating the performance of composites having alternate layers of conducting and magnetic materials in a virtual waveguide measurement environment based on the finite element method (FEM). The EMI SE of multilayered heterogeneous arrangements (MHAs) is simulated in the K-band region using ANSYS High Frequency Structure Simulator (HFSS) software, which can be extended to all other bands as well. Various simulations carried out by changing the order of the conducting and magnetic layers and the number of layers revealed that the strategic arrangement of electromagnetic (EM) energy-trapping layers inside the impedance-matching layers in the MHAs significantly contributes toward the enhancement of absorption-dominated EMI shielding. Among the MHAs, the conducting-magnetic-conducting (CMC) systems exhibited the highest shielding effectiveness of above 50 dB. The MHAs are realized for testing using poly(vinylidene fluoride)-based composites of low-cost carbon black and barium hexaferrite, an easily accessible ferrite. Through this study, we propose the idea that materials with high production cost and cumbersome fabrication procedures are not necessary to realize highly efficient shielding materials.

Flexible, robust, sandwich structure polyimide composite film with alternative MXene and Ag NWs layers for electromagnetic interference shielding

The design and fabrication of electromagnetic interference shielding films with a novel structure to eliminate undesirable electromagnetic pollution is an important research direction. However, it is still a challenge to combine and organize nanofillers in different dimensions into the structured network in polymer-based electromagnetic interference (EMI) shielding composites. In this work, a sandwich structure polyimide (PI) composite film with alternative 2D-MXene network and 1D-Silver nanowires (Ag NWs) network was prepared through the “electrospinning-immersion-hot pressing” method. With the increase of Ag NWs content, the EMI shielding effectiveness (SE) gradually increases while maintaining good flexibility and mechanical robustness. The EMI SE and the tensile strength of 150 μm thick sandwich composite film can reach up to 79.54 dB and 39.82 MPa, respectively. The prepared flexible and robust PI composite film with a sandwich structure has high EMI SE with less metal content, which can provide guidelines for the development of high-performance EMI polymeric films with potentials in wearable devices and equipment.

High-temperature oxidation mechanism of ZrCoSb-based half-Heusler thermoelectric compounds

ZrCoSb-based half-Heusler (HH) compounds are among the most promising thermoelectric (TE) materials for high-temperature power generation. Oxidation resistance is one of the key issues for realizing the practical application of TE materials for long-term service in the ambient working environment. In this work, the oxidation behavior of Zr0.5Hf0.5CoSb0.8Sn0.2 (ZHCSS) half-Heusler is systematically studied in the service temperature range from 873 to 1073 K. It is revealed that three typical layers of oxidation products tend to form on the surface of HH sample, namely, the dense oxide layer (DOL) composed of (Zr,Hf)O2 and CoSb, the alternate oxide layer (AOL) composed of repeated (Zr,Hf)O2 and CoSb2O6/Co3O4, and the CoSb layer between the DOL and AOL. The mass gain during oxidation is mainly caused by the rapid growth of AOL, which is controlled by the outward diffusion of Zr/Hf and the inward diffusion of oxygen. The formation of a continuous CoSb layer and DOL is found beneficial to block the outward diffusion of Zr/Hf. Based on the analysis of the dominant factors on the outward and inward diffusions as well as the reaction activation energy, a simple approach is proposed to improve the oxidation resistance of Zr0.5Hf0.5CoSb0.8Sn0.2 by pre-oxidizing the sample in low oxygen pressure to form the dense (Zr,Hf)O2 and CoSb layers as oxidation protecting and/or diffusion blocking layers. The oxidation test shows the effectiveness of such pre-oxidation on the formation and growth of the AOL and therefore on improving the service stability of Zr0.5Hf0.5CoSb0.8Sn0.2 at high temperatures in the air.

Stable Quantum Dot Light-Emitting Diodes Employing TiO2 Nanoparticles as a Mixed Emission Layer

Colloidal quantum dots (QDs) have attractive optical and electrical characteristics for various applications in the display industry. They have superb properties including color tunability, which is achieved by controlling the particle size and solution processes used for quantum dot light-emitting diodes (QLEDs). Here we demonstrate high efficiency QLEDs that consist of a mixed layer of TiO2 nanoparticles (NPs) and QDs. ZnO is the key material responsible for the promising results of the electroluminescence devices, which exhibited well-matched energy levels and robustness. In this report, Li-doped TiO2 NPs were synthesized under ambient conditions as an alternative electron transport layer (ETL) for QLEDs. A stable mixture of TiO2 NPs and QDs was prepared in chlorobenzene and then applied to QLEDs without a conventional ETL. QLEDs with such a simplified structure produce a maximum luminance of 123,311 cd/m<sup>2</sup> with a current efficiency of 40.5 cd/A. These results are comparable to those of conventional QLEDs. Additionally, the predicted T50 at 100 cd/m<sup>2</sup> was 1,420 h, based on the T50 at 1,600 cd/m<sup>2</sup>. These clearly indicate not only the promising results of the TiO2 NPs as an inorganic ETL, but also the remarkable performance of the simplified device with less layers. The reduction in fabrication steps using this solution-based process is also advantageous for next-generation display technology.

Emerging homogeneous superlattices in CaTiO3 bulk thermoelectric materials.

The thermal conductivity of superlattices is strongly reduced as compared to that of the parent materials due to phonon-scattering and thermal boundary resistances at the superlattice period interfaces. Herein, homogenous superlattices consisting of homogenous structural CeδCa1-δTiO3 and CaTi1-δCeδO3 alternate layers were obtained through a variable-valence Ce doping, providing multi-quantum well interfaces between the alternate layers due to Ce-substitution at Ca and Ti sites, respectively. This material comprising these homogenous superlattices displayed a significantly reduced lattice thermal conductivity of 1.82 W m-1 K-1 and a record high zT value of 0.405 at 1031 K in CaTiO3-based thermoelectric materials. This strategy of synthesizing homogeneous superlattices provides a cost advantage over heterogeneous superlattices prepared by the molecular beam epitaxy method and paves a route for preparing bulk superlattices with unique thermoelectric properties rooting in the quantum domain limiting effect.

Changer: Feature Interaction is What You Need for Change Detection

Change detection is an important tool for long-term earth observation missions. It takes bi-temporal images as input and predicts “where” the change has occurred. Different from other dense prediction tasks, a meaningful consideration for change detection is the interaction between bi-temporal features. With this motivation, in this paper we propose a novel general change detection architecture, MetaChanger, which includes a series of alternative interaction layers in the feature extractor. To verify the effectiveness of MetaChanger, we propose two derived models, ChangerAD and ChangerEx with simple interaction strategies: Aggregation-Distribution (AD) and feature “exchange”. AD is abstracted from some complex interaction methods, and feature “exchange” is a completely parameter&computation-free operation by exchanging bi-temporal features. In addition, for better alignment of bi-temporal features, we propose a Flow-based Dual-Alignment Fusion (FDAF) module which allows interactive alignment and feature fusion. Crucially, we observe Changer series models achieve competitive performance on different scale change detection datasets. Further, our proposed ChangerAD and ChangerEx could serve as a starting baseline for future MetaChanger design. Code and weights are made available at https://github.com/likyoo/open-cd.

Application of Vertical Electrical Sounding for Subsurface Characterization to Determineslope Instability at Perizie, Nagaland

Vertical Electrical Sounding (VES) technique which employs the Schlumberger depth sounding method was used to investigate the subsurface conditions at the landslide in Perizie colony, Kohima. The interpretation of the VES curves shows differing lithology consisting of weathered shales with associated clay, which is considered an important factor for slope instability. The shear strength of the slope materials, including the country rocks and the soil cover, is also significantly reduced and easily detached due to the effects of weathering and erosion, causing the landslides. Three to six possible geo-electric layers are delineated from the variations in the resistivity values, with the lithologies consisting of topsoil followed by alternate layers of weathered and fractured rocks of varying thickness. The analysis also points to the presence of a weak zone at a depth of about 10 m, which is not apparent from the surface. The formation of groundwater aquifers in the fractured zones indicates high risk for slope failure as this accelerates the weak country rocks to weather. The results obtained by this study correspond well with the available borehole data of the area.

Fabrication and Characterization of Ag–Ta Thin Films by Co-Magnetron Sputtering as Alternative Layer for High Reflection of NIR Radiation

Silver–tantalum (Ag–Ta) thin films were fabricated by magnetron co-sputtering on silicon (Si) wafer (100) and glass slide substrates at room temperature. The Ag–Ta thin films were prepared at various deposition times of 5, 10, 20 and 30 s and the physical, structural and optical properties of the Ag–Ta thin films were investigated. It was determined that the thicknesses of the films were 7, 9, 17 and 33 nm, respectively. The results revealed that an increase in the film thickness leads to a monotonic increase in FCC and BCC phase of Ag and Ta, respectively. The work function and stoichiometric of the Ag–Ta thin films were investigated by ultraviolet and X-ray photoemission spectroscopies (UPS and XPS), respectively. The potential of Ag–Ta thin films to be used as low-emission coating was investigated using a spectrophotometer. A UV–VIS–NIR spectrophotometer was used to measure the spectral reflectance in the wavelength range from 300 to 2000 nm. The results showed that the Ag–Ta thin film deposited for 30 s exhibited higher reflectance in NIR region than those of 5, 10, 20 and 30 s. It demonstrated an average reflectance of about 80% and slightly decreased to 75% after being kept in the air atmosphere for 28 days. It can be likewise proposed as an alternative thin film with high reflectance of NIR radiation single layer to develop industrial low-emission coating for cost-effective, clean, and easy adaptation to a large area coating.

High-Performance Inverted Organic Solar Cells via the Incorporation of Thickness-Insensitive and Low-Temperature-Annealed Nonconjugated Polymers as Electron Transport Materials.

Developing new electron transport layers has been an effective way to fabricate high-performance bulk-heterojunction organic solar cells (OSCs). Resolving the longstanding problems associated with commonly used zinc oxide (ZnO), such as electron traps and light-induced device deterioration, however, is still a great challenge. In this study, glycerol diglycidyl ether (GDE) and 1,4-butanesultone (BS) are blended with polyethyleneimine (PEI) to produce cross-linkable PEI-based materials, PEI-GDE and PEI-GDE-BS, which can function as alternative electron transport layers to replace conventional ZnO cathode-modifying layers in inverted OSCs. PEI-GDE and PEI-GDE-BS are amendable to low-temperature annealing processes to produce cross-linked films. The inverted device structure of ITO/ETL/PM6:BTP-BO-4F:PC71BM/MoO3/Ag was used to evaluate the effects of incorporating PEI-GDE and PEI-GDE-BS as electron transport materials. Compared with ZnO-based devices, the PEI-GDE- and PEI-GDE-BS-based devices exhibit significant improvements in photovoltaic performances due to smoother surface roughness, higher charge collection and exciton dissociation efficiencies, higher electron mobilities, and stronger π-π interactions. In particular, a PEI-GDE-BS-based device shows an outstanding power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 17.55% with a VOC of 0.83 V, a JSC of 27.88 mA/cm2, and an FF of 75.96%, which offers great possibilities in the applications of flexible solar cells.

FOXA1/2 depletion drives global reprogramming of differentiation state and metabolism in a human liver cell line and inhibits differentiation of human stem cell-derived hepatic progenitor cells.

FOXA factors are critical members of the developmental gene regulatory network (GRN) composed of master transcription factors (TF) which regulate murine cell fate and metabolism in the gut and liver. How FOXA factors dictate human liver cell fate, differentiation, and simultaneously regulate metabolic pathways is poorly understood. Here, we aimed to determine the role of FOXA2 (and FOXA1 which is believed to compensate for FOXA2) in controlling hepatic differentiation and cell metabolism in a human hepatic cell line (HepG2). siRNA mediated knockdown of FOXA1/2 in HepG2 cells significantly downregulated albumin (p < .05) and GRN TF gene expression (HNF4α, HEX, HNF1ß, TBX3) (p < .05) and significantly upregulated endoderm/gut/hepatic endoderm markers (goosecoid [GSC], FOXA3, and GATA4), gut TF (CDX2), pluripotent TF (NANOG), and neuroectodermal TF (PAX6) (p < .05), all consistent with partial/transient reprograming. shFOXA1/2 targeting resulted in similar findings and demonstrated evidence of reversibility of phenotype. RNA-seq followed by bioinformatic analysis of shFOXA1/2 knockdown HepG2 cells demonstrated 235 significant downregulated genes and 448 upregulated genes, including upregulation of markers for alternate germ layers lineages (cardiac, endothelial, muscle) and neurectoderm (eye, neural). We found widespread downregulation of glycolysis, citric acid cycle, mitochondrial genes, and alterations in lipid metabolism, pentose phosphate pathway, and ketogenesis. Functional metabolic analysis agreed with these findings, demonstrating significantly diminished glycolysis and mitochondrial respiration, with concomitant accumulation of lipid droplets. We hypothesized that FOXA1/2 inhibit the initiation of human liver differentiation in vitro. During human pluripotent stem cells (hPSC)-hepatic differentiation, siRNA knockdown demonstrated de-differentiation and unexpectedly, activation of pluripotency factors and neuroectoderm. shRNA knockdown demonstrated similar results and activation of SOX9 (hepatobiliary). These results demonstrate that FOXA1/2 controls hepatic and developmental GRN, and their knockdown leads to reprogramming of both differentiation and metabolism, with applications in studies of cancer, differentiation, and organogenesis.

Photonic band-edge assisted enhanced nonlinear absorption of carbon encapsulated gold nanostructures in polymeric multilayers

Integration of nonlinear optical materials in nanophotonic structures offers unprecedented opportunities to tailor the light-matter interaction, resulting in tunable optical responses. Periodic dielectric structures are particularly the desired optical platform to incorporate nonlinear materials to enhance their weak nonlinearity for practical applications. In this work, we report the giant enhancement in the nonlinear absorption of a 1-D polymer photonic crystal containing gold-carbon (Au@C) core–shell structure. The Au@C nanostructures synthesized by pulsed laser ablation technique were dispersed in spin-coated alternate layers of photonic crystal comprised of polyvinyl carbazole and cellulose acetate. The long-wavelength photonic band-edge of the polymeric Bragg mirror was designed at 532 nm to enhance the non-resonant nonlinear absorption of the core–shell nanostructure. The resultant nonlinearity is ascribed to slow light propagation at the band-edges and consequent local field confinement of optical pulses. Angle-dependent tunability of photonic band-edge effects and nonlinear transmission characteristics were analyzed experimentally and correlated with numerical simulations. These findings open up new ways to implement cost-effective, highly tunable and low input threshold all-optical devices.

Numerical Study of 25.459% Alloyed Inorganic Lead-Free Perovskite CsSnGeI3-Based Solar Cell by Device Simulation

The toxic lead component as well as the expensive and less stable spiro-OMeTAD in perovskite solar cells (PSCs) pose a great deal of hindrance to their commercial viability. Herein, a computational approach towards modeling and simulation of all inorganic cesium tin-germanium triiodide (CsSnGeI3) based perovskite solar cell was proposed and implemented using solar cell capacitance simulator (SCAPS–1D) tool. Aluminium doped zinc oxide (ZnO:Al) and Copper Iodide (CuI) were used as electron and hole transport layers (ETL and HTL) respectively. The initial device without any optimization gave a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 24.826%, fill factor (FF) of 86.336%, short circuit current density (Jsc) of 26.174 mA/cm2 and open circuit voltage (Voc) of 1.099 V. On varying the aforementioned parameters individually while keeping others constant, the optimal values are 1000 nm for absorber thickness, 1014 cm-3 for absorber layer defect density, 50 nm for ETL thickness, 1017 cm-3 for ETL doping concentration and 260 K for temperature. Simulating with these optimized values results to PCE of 25.459%, Voc of 1.145 V, Jsc of 25.241 mA/cm2, and a FF of 88.060%. These results indicate that the CsSnGeI3 is a viable alternative absorbing layer for usage in the design of a high PCE perovskite solar cell device.

Dual Responsive Dependent Background Color Based on Thermochromic 1D Photonic Crystal Multilayer Films.

In this paper, we present dual responsive one-dimensional (1D) photonic crystal (PC) multilayer films that utilize a high-humidity environment and temperature. Dual responsive 1D PC multilayer films are fabricated on precoated thermochromic film by sequential alternate layer deposition of photo-crosslinkable poly(2-vinylnaphthalene-co-benzophenone acrylate) (P(2VN-co-BPA)) as a high refractive index polymer, and poly(4-vinylpyrollidone-co-benzophenone acrylate) P(4VP-co-BPA) as a low refractive index polymer. The thermochromic film shows a vivid color transition from black to white at 28 °C. Three different colors of thermochromic 1D PC multilayer films are prepared by thickness modulation of P(4VP-co-BPA) layers, and the films on a black background exhibit visible spectrum color only in a high-humidity environment (over 90% relative humidity (RH)). For the three films placed on a hands display, three different composite colors are synthesized by the reflection of light, including yellow, magenta, and cyan, due to the changing of backgrounds from black to white with temperature. Additionally, the films show remarkable color transitions with reliable reversibility. The films can be applied as anti-counterfeiting labels and can be used for smart decoration films. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first report of dual response colorimetric films that change color in various ways depending on temperature and humidity changes, and we believe that it can be applied to various applications.

Design of a plane grating with multilayer coating for the soft X-ray tomography beamline

An alternate multilayer plane grating has been designed for the soft X-ray tomography beamline. At this beamline, a grating with 600 line/mm and Au coating has already been set up to serve the energy range from 260 eV to 1200 eV. To fit the original optical design, a varied-line-spacing plane grating optimized at 2473 eV will be used in this beamline. The groove depth is 2.5 nm and its duty cycle is 0.5. The B4C/Mo alternate layers with period 30 are selected to enhance diffraction efficiency in the energy range 1100 eV -- 2600 eV. The varied-line-spacing plane grating paired with a matched multilayer plane mirror constitutes a monochromator to provide energetic photons. Based on the designed multilayer conditions, the calculated diffraction efficiency of alternate multilayer varied-line-spacing plane grating is about 0.24 at 2473 eV; the calculated photon flux is about 2.3 × 1011 photons/s. The resolving power is about 1670; the openings of the entrance and exit slits are 25 and 50 μm respectively.

Processing induced morphology change in ZnO-TiO2 multilayer thin films and its effect on their photocatalytic activity under visible light irradiation

Multilayer films with alternate layers of zinc and titanium sols on glass and quartz, when prepared following two different protocols, showed significantly altered morphology after calcination. On glass, after calcination, pairs of layer of zinc-on-titanium sols deposited and dried at 180 °C, referred as TlZ, showed a network of vertical walls with sharp boundaries, whereas samples with each sol layer dried before next coating, referred as TsZ, had wrinkled boundaries. On quartz we prepared ZlT and ZsT films with order in the pair switched. Upon calcination at 900 °C, ZlT showed flat polycrystalline films, and ZsT vertically stacked crystallites. Quartz samples showed formation of rhombohedral zinc-titanate due to higher temperature, and photocatalytic activity towards Methylene Blue degradation under visible light illumination, but a higher photocatalytic activity was observed in ZsT films due to vertically stacked crystallites offering higher area. Difference in sol-viscosity and surface energies of crystalline phases influence the morphology.

Synthesis of intermetallic FePtPd nanoparticles and their enhanced catalysis for electro-oxidation of methanol

Searching for efficient and CO-tolerant catalysts for electro-oxidation of methanol is desirable for the development of direct-methanol fuel cells. Here, we present a novel and facile procedure for the synthesis of intermetallic face-centered tetragonal (fct)-Fe50PtxPd50-x Nanoparticles (NPs) with Fe and Pt/Pd atoms forming alternative layers, which are highly active and stable in catalyzing methanol oxidation reaction (MOR) in 0.1 M HClO4 and 0.2 M methanol aqueous solution. The carbon-supported fct-Fe48Pt35Pd17 NPs show the highest peak current density of 626 A g−1Pt at 909 mV (vs RHE) over fcc-Fe48Pt35Pd17 (428 Ag−1Pt at 930 mV) and the commercial Pt (218 Ag−1Pt at 952 mV). The superior performance observed on the fct-Fe48Pt35Pd17 NPs is attributed to the stabilization of Pd by the intermetallic fct-structure, which improves the Pt CO-tolerance and catalytic activity. The activity of fct-FePtPd depends further on the Pt/Pd ratios. An increase in Pd content improves CO tolerance but reduces the number of active Pt sites on NPs surface, and the optimized Pt/Pd ratio should be around 1.0. Our work demonstrates a new approach to the rational design and synthesis of highly active NP catalysts for MOR.

Performance enhancement of Sb2Se3-based solar cell with hybrid buffer layer and MoSe2 as a hole transport material using simulator device

In this work, we first compared the experimental and simulated J-V characteristics of the Sb2Se3-based solar cell without and with a hybrid buffer layer using SCAPS-1D software. The introduction of a second buffer layer reduces the current leakage caused at the front contact of the solar cell and the power conversion efficiency (PCE) increases from 3.75% to 5.18%; and the use of the ternary compound cadmium zinc sulfide (CdZnS), as an alternative electron transport layer (ETL) to the traditional cadmium sulfide (CdS), increases the PCE from 5.18% to 7.13%. Thereafter, different thicknesses of the SnO2/CdZnS hybrid buffer layer were simulated, and the optimization resulted in a value of 50 nm, with thicknesses of 10 nm and 40 nm for the SnO2 and CdZnS layers respectively. Furthermore, the optimization of the Sb2Se3 absorber allows to obtain a bulk defect density of 1011 cm−3 and a carrier capture cross section of 10–14 cm2. Finally, the low doping problem of the absorber is solved by forming a MoSe2 layer at the Sb2Se3/Mo interface. MoSe2 acts as a hole transport material (HTM) and is used for high mobility of charge carriers within it; moreover, its presence improves the performance of the Sb2Se3-based solar cell and a PCE of 18.77% (JSC = 34.37 mA/cm2, VOC = 660 mV, FF = 82.78%) is obtained. Our simulation results also show that the n-i-p configuration of the Sb2Se3-based solar cell is more stable.