Call | ANR PRCI / DPG
Coordinator | Zhuoying Chen (Laboratoire de Physique et d’Etude des Matériaux, ESPCI)
Partner | TU Dresden, Germany
Starting date & duration | 2018, 36 months
Abstract | Facing the rising energy usage worldwide, we urgently need to increase the proportion of electricity generated from clean and renewable energy sources. Organic, colloidal nanocrystal quantum dots (QDs), and hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites are highly promising solution-processable material candidates for “third-generation” solar cells. Their unique material characteristics can lead to flexible, light-weight, low-cost and high-performance solar cells and enable non-conventional solar cell products. While the efficiencies are being improved constantly by intensive research, the Achilles heel of these devices seems to be their environmental instability. Therefore, in this “PROCES” project we aim to (1) identify the fundamental causes of degradation of organic, inorganic nanocrystal and hybrid organic-inorganic thin films ; (2) understand the physical origin of degradation, i.e. the formation of degradation products ; (3) correlate the changes in device characteristics to the causes identified ; and (4) develop strategies to improve material and device stability. It can be anticipated that through this study we will gain fundamental understanding of how different choices of materials (organic, nanocrystal, or hybrid components), their synthetic and surface chemistry, and different device architectures, impact on the device degradation mechanisms.
