Flexible Substrate‐Structured Sb₂S₃ Solar Cells with Back Interface Selenization

Abstract

Antimony sulfide (Sb2S3) with a 1D molecular structure has strong bending characteristics, showing great application potential in flexible devices. Herein, the flexible substrate‐structured Sb2S3 solar cells is developed and improve device performances by the back interface selenization. The high‐quality Sb2S3 film with an optimal thickness of 1.8 µm, ensuring efficient spectra utilization, is deposited on flexible Mo foils by the rapid thermal evaporation technique. To solve the issues of back interfacial recombination and charge transport, the 20 nm MoSe2 layer between Sb2S3 film and Mo foil is fabricated by substrate selenization in the tube furnace. Further investigations indicate that the MoSe2 layer improves the interfacial energy band alignments and induces the [hk1] orientation of Sb2S3 film, thereby passivating defects and enhancing the carrier transport capacity. The flexible solar cell in the structure of Mo foil/MoSe2/Sb2S3/CdS/ITO/Ag, exhibiting good flexibility to stand thousands of bending, achieves an efficiency of 3.75%, which is the highest for Sb2S3 devices in substrate configuration. The presented flexible structure and back interfacial selenization study will provide new prospects for inorganic Sb2S3 thin film solar cells.

Anisotropy-Driven Crystallization of Dimensionally Resolved Quasi-1D Van der Waals Nanostructures

“…As such, we focused on Sb 2 S 3 , a q-1D vdW phase that belongs to a family of earth-abundant Pn 2 Ch 3 pnictochalcogenides (Pn = pnictogen, e.g., Sb and Bi; and Ch = chalcogen, e.g., S and Se) (Figure ). These phases have been heavily studied due to their optical and electronic properties, which include visible-to-near-infrared band gaps reported in the 1.1 to 1.8 eV range and substantial optical absorption coefficient suitable for thin-film solar energy conversion devices. − More recently, studies have shown that the photovoltaic efficiencies of thin films based on Sb 2 S 3 are strongly dependent on the crystallographic orientation of the polycrystalline domains, implying that the physical properties of these pnictochalcogenides are inherently tied to their morphologies and nanocrystalline structures. − Encouragingly, numerous computational studies have predicted the size- and orientation-dependent indirect-to-direct band gap crossover in Sb 2 S 3 upon confinement due to the small energy differences in the conduction band states along and across the chains. − …”

Bulk Defect Passivation for Full‐Inorganic Sb2S3 Solar Cells by Sulfur‐Atmosphere Recrystallization Process

“…Amorphous Sb 2 S 3 Film Deposition: The amorphous Sb 2 S 3 films were deposited on the clean substrates using the RTE vacuum equipment (OTF-1200X) at low deposition temperature. [27,44] The Sb 2 S 3 powder (98%, Aladdin Industrial Corporation) with 0.4 g was uniformly sprinkled on the clean glass as an evaporation source. The substrate covered by a graphite block was face-down mounted on the top.…”

A comprehensive insight into deep-level defect engineering in antimony chalcogenide solar cells

“…12–15 In addition to generic power production (terawatt levels), Sb 2 X 3 solar cells are well suited for integration in futuristic, lightweight, flexible, and wearable electronic devices. 15–18…”