Abstract
Atomic layer-deposited tin oxide serves as an effective buffer layer in perovskite/silicon tandem solar cells due to its efficient charge extraction and sputtering tolerance. Nevertheless, its unavoidable chemical erosion effect of atomic layer-deposited tin oxide on perovskite requires thicker fullerene charge transport layers, leading to increased parasitic optical absorption. Herein, we firstly integrated thermal evaporated antimony oxide into solar cells to effectively replace atomic layer-deposited tin oxide, enabling a thinner fullerene to minimize optical losses and prevent damage to the perovskite. The unique amorphous-nanocrystalline structure of, antimony oxide facilitates ultrafast carrier transport via its embedded nanocrystalline network. The antimony oxide-based tandem solar cells demonstrated a significant improvement in power conversion efficiency compared to tin oxide-based devices, primarily due to an enhanced short-circuit current density of approximately 1 mA/cm² in the perovskite top cell. Remarkably, even at 64.64 cm2 scale, the antimony oxide-based encapsulated large-area tandem solar cell retains an efficiency of 28.16% (with a certified value of 27.70%), attesting the scalability of this approach.
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Acknowledgements
The authors are gratefully acknowledged for the financial support of the National Key Research and Development Program of China (Grant No. 2023YFB4202503), the Joint Funds of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. U21A2072), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 62274099), the Overseas Expertise Introduction Project for Discipline Innovation of Higher Education of China (Grant No. B16027), Yunnan Provincial Science and Technology Project at Southwest United Graduate School (Grant No. 202302A0370009), Tianjin Science and Technology Project (Grant No. 24ZXZSSS00160), the Haihe Laboratory of Sustainable Chemical Transformations and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities, Nankai University.
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B.S. and Z.S. contributed equally to this work and proposed the research and designed the experiments. P.L. help with the preparation of screen-printing metal grids. W.H. and R.K. help with the fabrication of transparent electrodes. Yi.L. and C.S. help with the fabrication of the ALD buffer layer. Yu.L. helped the fabrication of nickel oxide hole transfer layer. D.Z. helped the fabrication of metal electrode.Xi.Z., B.S., X.W., Z.Z., and X.D. provided testing help. 1 cm2 bottom cell development and fabrication by F.Z., M.Y, Y.H., B.H., and X.X. 64.64 cm2 bottom cell development and fabrication by R.X, Xu.Z., Y.C., and J.G. Z.S. wrote the first version of the manuscript. Xi.Z., F.X. and S.D.W. revised the manuscript. Xi.Z. directed the overall project. Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to Xi.Z.
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Shi, B., Sunli, Z., Liu, P. et al. Antimony oxide buffer layer for single- and double-junction perovskite-based solar cells. Nat Commun (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-70848-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-026-70848-8
