8.4% efficient fullerene-free organic solar cells exploiting long-range exciton energy transfer

Nature Communications

Volumn 5, Issue , 2014, Pages

  Cnops, Kjell ^a,b   Rand, Barry P ^a,c   Cheyns, David ^a   Verreet, Bregt ^a   Empl, Max A ^a,b   Heremans, Paul ^a,b  

^a IMEC   (Belgium)

^b UNIVERSITY OF LEUVEN   (Belgium)

^c Princeton University   (United States)

Author keywords

[No Author keywords available]

Indexed keywords

FULLERENE; FULLERENE DERIVATIVE; INDOLE DERIVATIVE; ORGANIC COMPOUND; PHTHALOCYANINE;

ENERGY EFFICIENCY; ENERGY FLOW; FULLERENE; SOLAR POWER; SOLAR RADIATION;

ARTICLE; DISSOCIATION; ELECTRIC CURRENT; ELECTRIC POTENTIAL; ELECTRICAL EQUIPMENT; ENERGY TRANSFER; ORGANIC SOLAR CELL; PARTICLE SIZE; QUANTUM CHEMISTRY; ALGORITHM; ATOMIC FORCE MICROSCOPY; CHEMICAL MODEL; CHEMICAL STRUCTURE; CHEMISTRY; FLUORESCENCE RESONANCE ENERGY TRANSFER; LUMINESCENCE; POWER SUPPLY; PROCEDURES; SOLAR ENERGY; SPECTROPHOTOMETRY;

ALGORITHMS; ELECTRIC POWER SUPPLIES; ENERGY TRANSFER; FLUORESCENCE RESONANCE ENERGY TRANSFER; FULLERENES; INDOLES; LUMINESCENCE; MICROSCOPY, ATOMIC FORCE; MODELS, CHEMICAL; MOLECULAR STRUCTURE; ORGANIC CHEMICALS; SOLAR ENERGY; SPECTROPHOTOMETRY;

EID: 84896795655     PISSN: None     EISSN: 20411723     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1038/ncomms4406     Document Type: Article

References (43)

1. Forrest, S. R. The path to ubiquitous and low-cost organic electronic appliances on plastic. Nature 428, 911-918 (2004). (Pubitemid 38568095)
2. Service, R. F. Outlook brightens for plastic solar cells. Science 332, 293 (2011).
3. Green, M. A., Emery, K., Hishikawa, Y., Warta, W. & Dunlop, E. D. Solar cell efficiency tables (version 41). Prog. Photovolt. Res. Appl. 21, 1-11 (2013).
4. Tang, C. W. Two-layer organic photovoltaic cell. Appl. Phys. Lett. 48, 183-185 (1986).
5. Peumans, P., Uchida, S. & Forrest, S. R. Efficient bulk heterojunction photovoltaic cells using small-molecular-weight organic thin films. Nature 425, 158-162 (2003). (Pubitemid 37150889)
6. Dennler, G., Scharber, M. C. & Brabec, C. J. Polymer-fullerene bulkheterojunction solar cells. Adv. Mater. 21, 1323-1338 (2009).
7. Cheyns, D., Rand, B. P. & Heremans, P. Organic tandem solar cells with complementary absorbing layers and a high open-circuit voltage. Appl. Phys. Lett. 97, 033301 (2010).
8. You, J. et al. A polymer tandem solar cell with 10.6% power conversion efficiency. Nat. Commun. 4, 1446 (2013).
9. Mishra, A. & Baüerle, P. Small molecule organic semiconductors on the move: promises for future solar energy technology. Angew. Chem. Int. Ed. 51, 2020-2067 (2012).
10. Lin, Y., Li, Y. & Zhan, X. Small molecule semiconductors for high-efficiency organic photovoltaics. Chem. Soc. Rev. 41, 4245-4272 (2012).
11. Li, C.-Z., Yip, H.-L. & Jen, A. K.-Y. Functional fullerenes for organic photovoltaics. J. Mater. Chem. 22, 4161-4177 (2012).
12. He, Y. & Li, Y. Fullerene derivative acceptors for high performance polymer solar cells. Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 13, 1970-1983 (2011).
13. Hoke, E. T. et al. Recombination in polymer:fullerene solar cells with open-circuit voltages approaching and exceeding 1.0 v. Adv. Energy Mater. 3, 220-230 (2012).
14. Anthony, J. E. Small-molecule, nonfullerene acceptors for polymer bulk heterojunction organic photovoltaics. Chem. Mater. 23, 583-590 (2011).
15. Sonar, P., Fong Lim, J. P. & Chan, K. L. Organic non-fullerene acceptors for organic photovoltaics. Energy Environ. Sci. 4, 1558-1574 (2011).
16. Gommans, H. et al. Perfluorinated subphthalocyanine as a new acceptor material in a small-molecule bilayer organic solar cell. Adv. Funct. Mater. 19, 3435-3439 (2009).
17. Verreet, B. et al. A 4% efficient organic solar cell using a fluorinated fused subphthalocyanine dimer as an electron acceptor. Adv. Energy Mater. 1, 565-568 (2011).
18. Sullivan, P. et al. Halogenated boron subphthalocyanines as light harvesting electron acceptors in organic photovoltaics. Adv. EnergyMater. 1, 352-355 (2011).
19. Lin, C.-F. et al. Open-circuit voltage and efficiency improvement of subphthalocyanine-based organic photovoltaic device through deposition rate control. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 103, 69-75 (2012).
20. Beaumont, N. et al. Boron subphthalocyanine chloride as an electron acceptor for high-voltage fullerene-free organic photovoltaics. Adv. Funct. Mater. 22, 561-566 (2012).
21. Cnops, K., Rand, B. P., Cheyns, D. & Heremans, P. Enhanced photocurrent and open-circuit voltage in a 3-layer cascade organic solar cell. Appl. Phys. Lett. 101, 143301 (2012).
22. Pandey, R., Gunawan, A. A., Mkhoyan, K. A. & Holmes, R. J. Efficient organic photovoltaic cells based on nanocrystalline mixtures of boron subphthalocyanine chloride and C60. Adv. Funct. Mater. 22, 617-624 (2012).
23. Huang, J.-H., Velusamy, M., Ho, K.-C., Lin, J.-T. & Chu, C.-W. A ternary cascade structure enhances the efficiency of polymer solar cells. J. Mater. Chem. 20, 2820-2825 (2010).
24. Chen, M. C., Liaw, D. J., Huang, Y. C., Wu, H. Y. & Tai, Y. Improving the efficiency of organic solar cell with a novel ambipolar polymer to form ternary cascade structure. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 95, 2621-2627 (2011).
25. Huang, J. et al. Polymer bulk heterojunction solar cells employing Förster resonance energy transfer. Nat. Photon. 7, 479-485 (2013).
26. Barito, A. et al. Recovering lost excitons in organic photovoltaics using a transparent dissociation layer. J. Appl. Phys. 113, 203110 (2013).
27. Schlenker, C. W. et al. Cascade organic solar cells. Chem. Mater. 23, 4132-4140 (2011).
28. Ichikawa, M., Takekawa, D., Jeon, H.-G. & Banoukepa, G. D. R. Cascade-type excitation energy relay in organic thin-film solar cells. Org. Electron. 14, 814-820 (2013).
29. Sakai, J., Taima, T. & Saito, K. Efficient oligothiophene:fullerene bulk heterojunction organic photovoltaic cells. Org. Electron. 9, 582-590 (2008).
30. Rand, B. P. et al. Organic double-heterostructure photovoltaic cells employing thick tris(acetylacetonato)ruthenium(III) exciton-blocking layers. Adv. Mater. 17, 2714-2718 (2005). (Pubitemid 41677579)
31. Rand, B. P., Burk, D. P. & Forrest, S. R. Offset energies at organic semiconductor heterojunctions and their influence on the open-circuit voltage of thin-film solar cells. Phys. Rev. B 75, 115327 (2007).
32. Mutolo, K. L., Mayo, E. I., Rand, B. P., Forrest, S. R. & Thompson, M. E. Enhanced open-circuit voltage in subphthalocyanine/C60 organic photovoltaic cells. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 128, 8108-8109 (2006). (Pubitemid 43967734)
33. Verreet, B. et al. The characterization of chloroboron (III) subnaphthalocyanine thin films and their application as a donor material for organic solar cells. J. Mater. Chem. 19, 5295-5297 (2009).
34. Kobayashi, N., Ishizaki, T., Ishii, K. & Konami, H. Synthesis, spectroscopy, and molecular orbital calculations of subazaporphyrins, subphthalocyanines, subnaphthalocyanines, and compounds derived therefrom by ring expansion. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 121, 9096-9110 (1999).
35. Rubio, N., Jiménez-Banzo, A., Torres, T. & Nonell, S. Spectral and kinetic properties of the radical ions of chloroboron(III) subnaphthalocyanine. J. Photochem. Photobiol. A 185, 214-219 (2007).
36. Kahn, A., Koch, N. & Gao, W. Electronic structure and electrical properties of interfaces between metals and p-conjugated molecular films. J. Polym. Sci. B 41, 2529-2548 (2003).
37. Fitzner, R. et al. Correlation of p-conjugated oligomer structure with film morphology and organic solar cell performance. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 134, 11064-11607 (2012).
38. Chen, Y.-H. et al. Vacuum-deposited small-molecule organic solar cells with high power conversion efficiencies by judicious molecular design and device optimization. J. Am. Chem. Soc. 134, 13616-13623 (2012).
39. Förster, T. 10th Spiers Memorial Lecture. Transfer mechanisms of electronic excitation. Discuss. Faraday Soc. 27, 7-17 (1959).
40. Scully, S. R., Armstrong, P. B., Edder, C., Fréchet, J. M. J. & McGehee, M. D. Long-range resonant energy transfer for enhanced exciton harvesting for organic solar cells. Adv. Mater. 19, 2961-2966 (2007). (Pubitemid 47597896)
41. Luhman, W. A. & Holmes, R. J. Investigation of energy transfer in organic photovoltaic cells and impact on exciton diffusion length measurements. Adv. Funct. Mater. 21, 764-771 (2011).
42. Gommans, H., Schols, S., Kadashchuk, A. & Heremans, P. Exciton diffusion length and lifetime in subphthalocyanine films. J. Phys. Chem. C 113, 2974-2979 (2009).
43. Lunt, R. R., Giebink, N. C., Belak, A. A., Benziger, J. B. & Forrest, S. R. Exciton diffusion lengths of organic semiconductor thin films measured by spectrally resolved photoluminescence quenching. J. Appl. Phys. 105, 053711 (2009).