Energies (Apr 2021)

Dopant-Free All-Organic Small-Molecule HTMs for Perovskite Solar Cells: Concepts and Structure–Property Relationships

  • Mohamed M. H. Desoky,
  • Matteo Bonomo,
  • Roberto Buscaino,
  • Andrea Fin,
  • Guido Viscardi,
  • Claudia Barolo,
  • Pierluigi Quagliotto

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/en14082279
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 14, no. 8
p. 2279

Abstract

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Since the introduction of Perovskite Solar Cells, their photovoltaic efficiencies have grown impressively, reaching over 25%. Besides the exceptional efficiencies, those solar cells need to be improved to overcome some concerns, such as their intrinsic instability when exposed to humidity. In this respect, the development of new and stable Hole Transporting Materials (HTMs) rose as a new hot topic. Since the doping agents for common HTM are hygroscopic, they bring water in contact with the perovskite layer, thus deteriorating it. In the last years, the research focused on “dopant-free” HTMs, which are inherently conductive without any addition of dopants. Dopant-free HTMs, being small molecules or polymers, have still been a relatively small set of compounds until now. This review collects almost all the relevant organic dopant-free small-molecule HTMs known so far. A general classification of HTMs is proposed, and structure analysis is used to identify structure–property relationships, to help researchers to build better-performing materials.

Keywords