During the past decade, inorganic CQDs, namely the lead chalcogenides (e.g., PbS), have attracted tremendous attention in solution-processed solar cells. Due to the great efforts on CQDs synthesis modification, [7][8][9] surface passivation, [10][11][12] and device fabrication optimization, [13][14][15][16] PbS QD solar cells continue to progress at an extraordinary rate, improving overall efficiencies by ≈1% per year and currently have a certified power conversion efficiency (PCE) exceeding 12%. [17] Meanwhile, the past decade has witnessed unprecedented success of organicinorganic hybrid perovskites in PV applications, with the reported PCE of perovskite solar cells exceeding 23%. [18][19][20][21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28] However, the challenging stability issues of these hybrid perovskites further motivate the research of all-inorganic perovskites (CsPbX 3 , X = Cl − , Br − , I − or mixed halides) without any volatile organic components. [29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37][38] Among these all-inorganic perovskite materials, α-CsPbI 3 exhibits an ideal optical bandgap (E g ) of 1.73 eV for PV applications. However, the nonphotoactive orthorhombic phase (E g = 2.82 eV) is more thermodynamically preferred at low temperature. [29] Therefore, the perovskite phase of CsPbI 3 usually requires complex annealing processes at high temperature to achieve satisfactory film quality. As mentioned above, QD technology offers colloidal synthesis of conventional bulk materials, which Surface manipulation of quantum dots (QDs) has been extensively reported to be crucial to their performance when applied into optoelectronic devices, especially for photovoltaic devices. In this work, an efficient surface passivation method for emerging CsPbI 3 perovskite QDs using a variety of inorganic cesium salts (cesium acetate (CsAc), cesium idodide (CsI), cesium carbonate (Cs 2 CO 3 ), and cesium nitrate (CsNO 3 )) is reported. The Cs-salts post-treatment can not only fill the vacancy at the CsPbI 3 perovskite surface but also improve electron coupling between CsPbI 3 QDs. As a result, the free carrier lifetime, diffusion length, and mobility of QD film are simultaneously improved, which are beneficial for fabricating high-quality conductive QD films for efficient solar cell devices. After optimizing the post-treatment process, the short-circuit current density and fill factor are significantly enhanced, delivering an impressive efficiency of 14.10% for CsPbI 3 QD solar cells. In addition, the Cs-salt-treated CsPbI 3 QD devices exhibit improved stability against moisture due to the improved surface environment of these QDs. These findings will provide insight into the design of high-performance and low-trap-states perovskite QD films with desirable optoelectronic properties. Perovskite Quantum DotsThe ORCID identification number(s) for the author(s) of this article can be found under https://doi.Solution-processed colloidal quantum dots (CQDs) are promising candidates for the next generation photovoltaics (PVs) due to the excellent tuna...

Chemical doping is often used to enhance electric conductivity of the conjugated molecule as hole‐transporting material (HTM) for the application in optoelectronics. However, chemical dopants can promote ion migration at the electrical field, which deteriorates the device efficiency as well as increases the fabrication cost. Here, two star HTMs, namely 2,2′,7,7′‐tetrakis(N,N‐di‐p‐methoxyphenyl‐amine) 9,9′‐spirobifluorene (Spiro‐OMeTAD) and poly(triarylamine) are subjeted to chemical combination to yield dopant‐free N2,N2,N2′,N2′,N7,N7,N7′,N7′‐octakis(4‐methoxyphenyl)‐10‐phenyl‐10H‐spiro[acridine‐9,9′‐fluorene]‐2,2′,7,7′‐tetraamine (SAF‐OMe). The power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of 12.39% achieved by solar cells based on pristine, dopant‐free SAF‐OMe are among the highest reported for perovskite solar cells and are even comparable to devices based on chemically doped Spiro‐OMeTAD (14.84%). Moreover, using a HTM comprised of SAF‐OMe with an additional dopant results in a record PCE of 16.73%. Compared to Spiro‐OMeTAD‐based devices, SAF‐OMe significantly improves stability.

Current efforts on lead sulfide quantum dot (PbS QD) solar cells are mostly paid to the device architecture engineering and postsynthetic surface modification, while very rare work regarding the optimization of PbS synthesis is reported. Here, PbS QDs are successfully synthesized using PbO and PbAc · 3H O as the lead sources. QD solar cells based on PbAc-PbS have demonstrated a high power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 10.82% (and independently certificated values of 10.62%), which is significantly higher than the PCE of 9.39% for PbO-PbS QD based ones. For the first time, systematic investigations are carried out on the effect of lead precursor engineering on the device performance. It is revealed that acetate can act as an efficient capping ligands together with oleic acid, providing better surface coverage and replace some of the harmful hydroxyl (OH) ligands during the synthesis. Then the acetate on the surface can be exchanged by iodide and lead to desired passivation. This work demonstrates that the precursor engineering has great potential in performance improvement. It is also pointed out that the initial synthesis is an often neglected but critical stage and has abundant room for optimization to further improve the quality of the resultant QDs, leading to breakthrough efficiency.

Simultaneously increased current density and open circuit voltage were achieved through doping F4-TCNQ into PEDOT:PSS in inverted perovskite solar cells.

PbS quantum-dot (QD) solar cells are promising candidates for low-cost solution-processed photovoltaics. However, the device fabrication usually requires ten more times film deposition and rinsing steps, which is not ideal for scalable manufacturing. Here, a greatly simplified deposition processing is demonstrated by replacing methanol with acetonitrile (ACN) as the rinsing solvent. It is discovered that ACN can effectively "cure" the film cracks generated from the volume loss during the solid-state ligand-exchange process, which enables the deposition of thick and dense films with much fewer deposition steps. Meanwhile, due to the aprotic nature of ACN, fewer trap states can be introduced during the rinsing process. As a result, with only three deposition steps for the active layer, a CPVT-certified 11.21% power conversion efficiency is obtained, which is the highest efficiency ever reported for PbS QD solar cells employing a solid-state ligand-exchange process. More importantly, the simple film-deposition processing provides an opportunity for the future application of QDs in low-cost printing of optoelectronic devices.