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N-type conductive tin sulfide thin films: Towards environmentally friendly solar cells

Date:
December 13, 2021
Source:
Tohoku University
Summary:
Abundant, safe, and environmentally friendly, tin sulfide is predicted to be used in next generation solar cell panels. Now, a research group has used impurity doping to fabricate n-type conductive tin sulfide thin films, paving the way for their use in solar cells.
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FULL STORY

Tin sulfide (SnS) is an abundant, safe, and environmentally friendly solar cell material. This inexpensive material is forecast to be used in next-generation solar cell panels.

A research group led by Issei Suzuki and Sakiko Kawanishi, assistant professors at Tohoku University's Institute of Multidisciplinary Research for Advanced Materials, has fabricated n-type conductive SnS thin films by impurity doping for the first time.

Conventional SnS thin films are usually p-type conductive. Thus, SnS thin-film solar cells have been fabricated using a pn heterojunction with p-type SnS thin film and other n-type semiconductor thin films, such as CdS. However, the conversion efficiency of such heterojunction devices has stagnated at approximately 5%, rendering their use impractical.

The SnS thin-film solar cells employing a pn homojunction, which uses SnS thin films for both p-type and n-type layers, is expected to exhibit higher conversion efficiency. Yet, n-type conducive SnS thin films without toxic elements have never been achieved before.

Utilizing chlorine-doping and a sulfur plasma supply, the research group reduced the lattice defects inhibiting the n-type conversion of SnS, realizing the world's first n-type SnS thin films without toxic elements.

"Our realization paves the way for practical pn homojunction SnS thin-film solar cells," said Suzuki.


Story Source:

Materials provided by Tohoku University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


Journal Reference:

  1. Issei Suzuki, Sakiko Kawanishi, Sage R. Bauers, Andriy Zakutayev, Zexin Lin, Satoshi Tsukuda, Hiroyuki Shibata, Minseok Kim, Hiroshi Yanagi, Takahisa Omata. n-type electrical conduction in SnS thin films. Physical Review Materials, 2021; 5 (12) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevMaterials.5.125405

Cite This Page:

Tohoku University. "N-type conductive tin sulfide thin films: Towards environmentally friendly solar cells." ScienceDaily. ScienceDaily, 13 December 2021. <www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211213121820.htm>.
Tohoku University. (2021, December 13). N-type conductive tin sulfide thin films: Towards environmentally friendly solar cells. ScienceDaily. Retrieved December 1, 2024 from www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211213121820.htm
Tohoku University. "N-type conductive tin sulfide thin films: Towards environmentally friendly solar cells." ScienceDaily. www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/12/211213121820.htm (accessed December 1, 2024).

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