Grain boundary

Abstract: State-of-the-art photovoltaics use high-purity, large-area, wafer-scale single-crystalline semiconductors grown by sophisticated, high-temperature crystal growth processes. We demonstrate a solution-based hot-casting technique to grow continuous, pinhole-free thin films of organometallic perovskites with millimeter-scale crystalline grains. We fabricated planar solar cells with efficiencies approaching 18%, with little cell-to-cell variability. The devices show hysteresis-free photovoltaic response, which had been a fundamental bottleneck for the stable operation of perovskite devices. Characterization and modeling attribute the improved performance to reduced bulk defects and improved charge carrier mobility in large-grain devices. We anticipate that this technique will lead the field toward synthesis of wafer-scale crystalline perovskites, necessary for the fabrication of high-efficiency solar cells, and will be applicable to several other material systems plagued by polydispersity, defects, and grain boundary recombination in solution-processed thin films.

Abstract: Methods used to strengthen metals generally also cause a pronounced decrease in electrical conductivity, so that a tradeoff must be made between conductivity and mechanical strength. We synthesized pure copper samples with a high density of nanoscale growth twins. They showed a tensile strength about 10 times higher than that of conventional coarse-grained copper, while retaining an electrical conductivity comparable to that of pure copper. The ultrahigh strength originates from the effective blockage of dislocation motion by numerous coherent twin boundaries that possess an extremely low electrical resistivity, which is not the case for other types of grain boundaries.

Abstract: Below 1000°C the oxidation of nickel cannot be controlled by the diffusion of ions through the bulk crystal lattice of the pure oxide, because the measured oxidation rates are several orders of magnitude faster than would be predicted on this basis. Short-circuit diffusion through oxide grain boundaries or dislocations has usually been held responsible, but there has hitherto been no proper quantitative confirmation of this mechanism. We report measurements of the oxide scale thickness and oxide grain size as a function of time during the oxidation of high-purity nickel in the temperature range 500–800°C. All the oxidation experiments were carried out in pure oxygen at a pressure of one atmosphere. The measured parabolic oxidation rate constants have been compared with those calculated from grain boundary diffusion data obtained in our previous work, using a grain boundary diffusion model for the oxidation process. The quantitative agreement between measured and calculated oxidation rates shows c...