Proceedings of MATSUS23 & Sustainable Technology Forum València (STECH23) (MATSUS23)
DOI: https://doi.org/10.29363/nanoge.matsus.2023.015
Publication date: 22nd December 2022
In order to further improve the efficiencies and in particular the open-circuit voltages of perovskite solar cells it is important to understand non-radiative recombination and their relation to defect densities. Here, the charge-carrier lifetime is frequently measured using transient spectroscopic techniques to provide an assay of charge carrier recombination. Frequently, the expectation is that at sufficiently low excitation conditions the experimentally observed lifetime should be a constant value that scales inversely with the defect density. We show that in (our) triple-cation perovskite films, layer stacks and devices, recombination is actually dominated by shallow defects, implying that the lifetime becomes a quantity that is continuously changing with carrier density. We thereby show that (i) it is not the low density of deep defects that limits the performance in typically triple-cation perovskites but a quite high density of shallow defects. Furthermore, we show that lifetime cannot be used anymore as a figure of merit if it is not plotted vs. carrier density, Fermi level splitting or voltage [1].