Publication date: 1st July 2014
Organometal halide perovskite based solar cells have recently been reported to be highly efficient, giving an overall power conversion efficiency of up to 15%. However, much of the fundamental photophysical properties underlying this performance have remained unknown. Here, we apply photoluminescence, transient absorption, time resolved terahertz and microwave conductivity measurements to determine the timescales of generation and recombination of charge carriers as well as their transport properties in solution-processed CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite materials. We found that electron-hole pairs are generated almost instantaneously after photoexcitation and dissociate in 2 ps forming highly mobile charges (25 cm2V-1s-1) in the neat perovskite and in perovskite/alumina blends; almost balanced electron and hole mobilities (μe= 12.5 cm2V-1s-1, μh = 7.5 cm2V-1s-1) remain very high up to the microsecond time scale. When the perovskite is introduced into a TiO2 mesoporous structure, electron injection from perovskite to the metal oxide is efficient in less than a picosecond but the lower intrinsic electron mobility of TiO2 (μ < 0.1 cm2V-1s-1) leads to unbalanced charge transport. Microwave conductivity measurements showed that the decay of mobile charges is very slow, lasting up to tens of microseconds. These results unravels the remarkable intrinsic properties of CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite material if used as intrinsic light absorber and charge transport layer. Moreover, finding a metal oxide with higher electron mobility may further increase the performance of this class of solar cells.