A general and facile solution approach for deposition of high-quality metal oxide charge transport layers

Metal oxide charge transport layers (CTLs) are significant components for fabricating high-performance thin film solar cells. Generally, sol-gel methods have been widely used to deposit high-quality metal oxide CTLs, but they usually suffer from the choices of solvents, ligands and metal precursors. Here we report a general and facile ionic liquid (n-butylammonium butyrate) approach to prepare V2O5, MoO3, WO3, NiO, ZnO and SnO2 thin films, which exhibits strong dissolving ability and good film-forming property. The thermal volatilization of ionic liquid is mild, which provides a slow and stable decomposition process of metal compounds and favors the formation of smooth and compact CTLs. All thin films are highly transparent in the visual range from the optical transmittance spectra and suitable to be CTLs in photovoltaic devices. Encouragingly, we have received the efficiencies of 15.06% and 13.38% based on the area of 0.09 and 1.21 cm(2) (NiO as the hole transport layer), and 19.13% and 16.71% based on the area of 0.09 and 1.21 cm(2) (SnO2 as the electron transport layer), which are obviously higher than those of devices prepared by traditional sol-gel methods.

Automated summary

Metal oxide thin films were successfully prepared using an ionic liquid approach, which showed strong dissolving ability and good film-forming property. These transparent films are suitable for use as charge transport layers in photovoltaic devices, and exhibited higher efficiencies compared to devices prepared by traditional sol-gel methods.