Abstract:
Perovskite solar cells (PSCs) often suffer from large performance variations which impede to define a
clear charge-transfer mechanism. Ferroelectric polarization is measured numerically using CH3NH3PbI3
(MAPbI3) pellets to overcome the measurement issues such as pinholes and low uniformity of thickness,
etc., with MAPbI3 thin films. MAPbI3 perovskite is an antiferroelectric semiconductor which is different
from typical semiconducting materials and ferroelectric materials. The effect of polarization carrier
separation on the charge-transfer mechanism in the PSCs is elucidated by using the results of ferroelectric
and structural studies on the perovskite. The ferroelectric polarization contributes to an inherent carrierseparation
effect and the I–V hysteresis. The ferroelectric and semiconducting synergistic chargeseparation
effect gives an alternative category of solar cells, ferroelectric semiconductor solar cells.
Our findings identify the ferroelectric semiconducting behavior of the perovskite absorber as being
significant to the improvement of the ferroelectric PSCs performances in future developments.
Citation:
Sewvandi, G. A., Hu, D., Chen, C., Ma, H., Kusunose, T., Tanaka, Y., Nakanishi, S., & Feng, Q. (2016). Antiferroelectric-to-ferroelectric switching in CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite and its potential role in effective charge separation in perovskite solar cells. Physical Review Applied, 6(2), 024007(1-11). https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevApplied.6.024007
