Efficiency enhancement of regular-type perovskite solar cells based on Al-doped ZnO nanorods as electron transporting layers

In this paper, we first incorporated Al(NO3)3·9H2O as the Al source into ZnO nanorods (NRs) lattice via the hydrothermal method to modify nature properties of ZnO NRs for the fabrication of perovskite solar cells (PSCs). The X-ray diffraction (XRD) pattern of Al-doped ZnO NRs exhibits higher 2θ values and stronger intensity of (002) plane. Larger optical band gap and higher electrical conductivity of Al-doped ZnO NRs are also observed relative to non-doped ZnO ones. The steady-state photoluminescence shows effective charge extraction and collection at the interface between Al-doped ZnO NRs and perovskite layer. The optimized PSC based on Al-doped ZnO NRs showed an open-circuit voltage of 0.84 V, a short-circuit current density of 21.93 mA/cm2, a fill factor of 57%, and a power conversion efficiency of 10.45% that was 23% higher than the non-doped ZnO ones.