The Research and Postgraduate Centre congratulates Prof. Zheng Jin-Cheng (corresponding author), Director of the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Centre, for their recent research article published in Energy & Fuels, which is a SCI Q1 journal aspiring to publish fundamental and applied research in the fields of energy and fuels.

This article was also selected as the journal’s cover image.

The article, titled “Simulation Study on the All-Inorganic CsSnxGe1–xI3-Based Perovskite Solar Cells Using Isotypic Perovskites as Hole Transport Layers,” explores how dopant concentration, absorber thickness, and hole transport layer (HTL) thickness influence the performance of CsSnxGe1–xI3-based PSCs. CsSnI3, CsGeI3, and CsSn0.5Ge0.5I3 were used as both absorbers and HTLs. The highest recorded efficiencies were 28.35%, 26.35%, 25.84%, 25.23%, 18.83%, 17.49%, and 11.79% across different device configurations, with the lowest efficiency observed in the TiO2/i-CsGeI3/p-CsSnI3 cell, attributed to band offset issues and high recombination rates.

The results suggest that n-p structures may offer better performance than traditional n-i-p structures, particularly when HTL defects from high doping are effectively controlled. The performance of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) is notably sensitive to defect density, with optimal efficiency achieved when defect density remains below approximately 5 × 10¹⁷ cm⁻³. Additionally, an increase in interface trap density negatively impacts performance. This research provides critical insights for the advancement of CsSnxGe1–xI3-based PSCs.

This research project jointly led by research groups of Assoc. Prof. Shuo Lin at Minnan Normal University and Prof. Zheng Jin-Cheng at Xiamen University & Xiamen University Malaysia. It was conducted with the support of the Natural Science Foundation of Fujian Province (nos. 2022J01915) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China.

Full article can be accessed at https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.energyfuels.4c03960