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Title: Monitoring a Silent Phase Transition in CH3NH3PbI3 Solar Cells via Operando X-ray Diffraction

Journal Article · · ACS Energy Letters
 [1];  [2];  [2];  [1];  [1];  [2];  [1]
  1. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States). Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL)
  2. National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
+ Show Author Affiliations

The relatively modest temperature of the tetragonal-to-cubic phase transition in CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite is likely to occur during real world operation of CH3NH3PbI3 solar cells. In this work, we simultaneously monitor the structural phase transition of the active layer along with solar cell performance as a function of the device operating temperature. The tetragonal to cubic phase transition is observed in the working device to occur reversibly at temperatures between 60.5 and 65.4 degrees C. In these operando measurements, no discontinuity in the device performance is observed, indicating electronic behavior that is insensitive to the structural phase transition. Here, this decoupling of device performance from the change in long-range order across the phase transition suggests that the optoelectronic properties are primarily determined by the local structure in CH3NH3PbI3. That is, while the average crystal structure as probed by X-ray diffraction shows a transition from tetragonal to cubic, the local structure generally remains well characterized by uncorrelated, dynamic octahedral rotations that order at elevated temperatures but are unchanged locally.

Research Organization:
National Renewable Energy Lab. (NREL), Golden, CO (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); USDOE Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy (EERE), Renewable Power Office. Solar Energy Technologies Office
Grant/Contract Number:
AC36-08GO28308; AC02-76SF00515; AC36-08-GO28308
OSTI ID:
1332911
Report Number(s):
NREL/JA-5900-67115
Journal Information:
ACS Energy Letters, Vol. 1, Issue 5; ISSN 2380-8195
Publisher:
American Chemical Society (ACS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 47 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (14)

Origins of the s-shape characteristic in J – V curve of inverted-type perovskite solar cells journal December 2019
Structural Evolution During Perovskite Crystal Formation and Degradation: In Situ and Operando X‐Ray Diffraction Studies journal November 2019
Band Dispersion and Hole Effective Mass of Methylammonium Lead Iodide Perovskite journal July 2018
A quantitative and spatially resolved analysis of the performance-bottleneck in high efficiency, planar hybrid perovskite solar cells journal January 2018
Thin‐film solar cells exceeding 22% solar cell efficiency: An overview on CdTe-, Cu(In,Ga)Se 2 -, and perovskite-based materials journal December 2018
A practical field guide to thermoelectrics: Fundamentals, synthesis, and characterization journal June 2018
The Relationship between Chemical Flexibility and Nanoscale Charge Collection in Hybrid Halide Perovskites journal March 2018
Research progress on organic–inorganic halide perovskite materials and solar cells journal February 2018
Solution‐Processable Perovskite Solar Cells toward Commercialization: Progress and Challenges journal April 2019
Chemically controlled crystal growth of (CH 3 NH 3 ) 2 AgInBr 6 journal January 2018
The existence and impact of persistent ferroelectric domains in MAPbI 3 journal January 2019
Progress of Surface Science Studies on ABX 3 ‐Based Metal Halide Perovskite Solar Cells journal April 2020
Terahertz Emission from Hybrid Perovskites Driven by Ultrafast Charge Separation and Strong Electron-Phonon Coupling journal January 2018
Insights into operational stability and processing of halide perovskite active layers journal January 2019

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14 SOLAR ENERGY
36 MATERIALS SCIENCE
perovskite
solar cells
operando
XRD
temperature
cubic
tetragonal
phase transition