Highly Bendable Flexible Perovskite Solar Cells on a Nanoscale Surface Oxide Layer of Titanium Metal Plates

We report highly bendable and efficient perovskite solar cells (PSCs) that use thermally oxidized layer of Ti metal plate as an electron transport layer (ETL). The power conversion efficiency (PCE) of flexible PSCs reaches 14.9% with a short-circuit current density (<i>J</i>_sc) of 17.9 mA/cm², open-circuit voltage (<i>V</i>_oc) of 1.09, and fill factor (ff) of 0.74. Moreover, the Ti metal-based PSCs exhibit a superior fatigue resistance over indium tin oxide/poly­(ethylene terephthalate) substrate. Flexible PSCs maintain 100% of their initial PCE even after PSCs are bent 1000 times at a bending radius of 4 mm. This excellent performance of flexible PSCs is due to high crystalline quality and low oxygen vacancy concentration of TiO₂ layer. The concentration of oxygen vacancies in the oxidized Ti metal surface controls the electric function of TiO₂ as ETL of PSCs. A decrease in the oxygen vacancy concentration of the TiO₂ layer is critical to improving the electron collection efficiency of the ETL. Our results suggest that Ti metal-based PSCs possess excellent mechanical properties, which can be applied to the renewable energy source for flexible electronics