Synthesis of SOT-OH and its application as a building block for the synthesis of new dimeric and trimeric Spiro-OMeTAD materials

Spiro-OMeTAD has become a ubiquitous hole-transporting material (HTM) in perovskite-based solar cells. However, it has several intrinsic drawbacks including its long-term stability, low conductivity and hole-mobility. Hence, the synthesis of new derivatives with improved charge transporting properties remains an important goal. Here, we have devised a novel synthetic route to prepare unsymmetrically functionalised Spiro-OMeTAD derivatives. We report the synthesis of a mono-demethylated Spiro-OMeTAD derivative, SOT-OH, utilising two different synthetic protocols and show two new derivatives, a dimer (SOT-D) and a trimer (SOT-T) as exemplars. We fully characterise the developed materials and show significantly higher conductivity values than Spiro-OMeTAD when doped with standard ionic salts at the same concentrations. The solar cells fabricated using the mixed composition Cs-0.05(FA(0.85)MA(0.15))(0.95)PbI3 perovskite and the novel SOT-D show power conversion efficiencies of up to 16.4% under standard AM1.5 illumination compared to 16.1% observed when using the benchmark Spiro-OMeTAD.

Automated summary

Spiro-OMeTAD, a commonly used hole-transporting material, has drawbacks in terms of stability, conductivity, and hole mobility. Therefore, the synthesis of new derivatives with improved charge transporting properties remains important. In this study, a novel synthetic route for unsymmetrically functionalised Spiro-OMeTAD derivatives was developed, and the synthesized materials showed higher conductivity values than Spiro-OMeTAD. Solar cells using the synthesized derivatives exhibited higher power conversion efficiencies compared to those using Spiro-OMeTAD.