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Aluminum (Al) placed in hot water (HW) at 90 °C is roughened due to its reaction with water, forming Al hydroxide and Al oxide, as well as releasing hydrogen gas. The roughened surface is thus hydrophilic and possesses a hugely increased surface area, which can be useful in applications requiring hydrophilicity and increased surface area, such as atmospheric moisture harvesting. On the other hand, when using HW to roughen specified areas of an Al substrate, ways to protect the other areas from HW attacks are necessary. We demonstrated that self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) of a fluorinated phosphonic acid (FPA, CF3(CF2)13(CH2)2P(=O)(OH)2) derivatized on the native oxide of an Al film protected the underneath metal substrate from HW attack. The intact wettability and surface morphology of FPA-derivatized Al subjected to HW treatment were examined using contact angle measurement, and scanning electron microscopy and atomic force microscopy, respectively. Moreover, the surface and interface chemistry of FPA-derivatized Al before and after HW treatment were investigated by time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry (ToF-SIMS), verifying that the FPA SAMs were intact upon HW treatment. The ToF-SIMS results therefore explained, on the molecular level, why HW treatment did not affect the underneath Al at all. FPA derivatization is thus expected to be developed as a patterning method for the formation of hydrophilic and hydrophobic areas on Al when combined with HW treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The feasibility of CuI and C60 as hole transport layer and electron transport layer in the perovskite solar cell is tested by using the software Solar Cell Capacitance Simulator (SCAPS). It is found that the thicknesses of the absorption layer, electron transport layer and hole transport layer, and the Interface Density of Defect State of their interface have a key influence on the efficiency of the perovskite solar cells. After optimization, the efficiency was as twice as that before, 22.70% to 11.62%, and the fill factor can still be at a high value, 76%.

Cu2O is considered as a good potential alternative material of Pt as the counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cell. While for Cu2O-based dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), the counter electrode is unstable, and the photoelectric conversion efficiency (PCE) is still very unsatisfactory. In this work, we tried alloy Sn to Cu2O for improvement. It turns out that Sn-alloyed Cu2O can produced uniform nanoholes in the counter electrode film, which can increase the specific surface area of electron transport. The process annealing can play important role for decrease the band gap of the film. The reaction time of Sn alloying has a key influence on the PCE of Sn-alloyed Cu2O-based DSSCs. Generally, more reaction time makes better PCE, of which in our experiments, the 8 h one has the best PCE than others, which has improved more than 5 times of the pure Cu2O one. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Theoretically, cuprous oxide (Cu 2 O) is a particularly excellent potential material, for the hole transport layer (HTL) of perovskite solar cells (PSCs). However, the photoelectric conversion efficiency (PCE) of its experimental samples is still not ideal. The main reasons for this include the material, and inherent and interface defects of Cu 2 O, but this can be improved by doping. In this research, Te- and Se/Te-doped Cu 2 O were experimentally and numerically studied to check the improvement of the material and interface properties. It was found that, for both the electrical and optical properties, the Se/Te-doped Cu 2 O performed considerably better than that which had been Te-doped and the pure Cu 2 O. Compared with the pure Cu 2 O thin film, the carrier mobility of the Se/Te-doped Cu 2 O thin film is improved from 60 cm 2 V -1 s -1 to 1297 cm 2 V -1 s -1 , and the bandgap changed from 2.05 eV to 1.88 eV. According to the results calculated using solar cell simulation software SCAPS, the cell efficiency of the Se/Te-doped Cu 2 O is improved by 22% when compared to that of pure Cu 2 O. This efficiency can be further improved to 34% by optimizing the thickness of the Se/Te-doped Cu 2 O thin film and the defect density of states between the material interfaces., Competing Interests: The authors declare that they have no known financial interests or personal relationships that could appear to influence the work in this paper., (This journal is © The Royal Society of Chemistry.)