Hole transporting materials for perovskite solar cells with enhanced stability and processability: from design to devices – ESPOIR2

Hole transporting materials for perovskite solar cells with enhanced stability and processability: from design to devices (ESPOIR2).

In the last ten years, we have witnessed one of the most impressive evolutions in the history of photovoltaics: the rise of perovskite solar cells with power conversion efficiency rising from 2% in 2006 to higher than 22 % in mid-2016 for single junction devices. Perovskite solar cell is thus becoming a promising emerging technology. In this context, production cost, device stability, leading to durability and long product’s life, are considered as the key performance parameters. However, the perovskite materials are very sensitive to corrosion and humidity, which impedes the commercial development in the long run and becomes one of the main issues needing to be solved urgently. As a solution at this respect, the ESPOIR2 project is oriented toward designing and tailoring nanographenes as new organic hole transporting materials. Nanographenes are designed to work as high efficient additive-free non-corrosive hole conductors, thus enhance the chemical stability of the perovskite layer. ESPOIR2 covers all aspects concerning materials development: from rational molecular design and theoretical simulation, synthesis and characterization to the incorporation of new materials in perovskite solar cells devices. The project is constructed based on a solid French-Korean research partnership led by Dr. Thanh-Tuân Bui (current project coordinator) and Prof. Nam-Gyu Park of Sungkyunkwan University, world-leading scientist in the perovskite solar cell fields. ESPOIR2 is organized in 4 dependent and strongly interactive work packages: WP0 (project management), WP1: nanographene molecular engineering and syntheis, WP2: nanographene materials advanced characterization, WP3: incorporation of nanographene in perovskite photovoltaic devices and device long-term stability investigation. The WP1 and WP2 will be realized within the Laboratory of Physicochemistry of Polymers and Interfaces of the University of Cery-Pontoise (France). The WP3 will be done at Sungkyunkwan University (South Korea) and partially at the University of Cergy-Pontoise.