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Title: Comparison of the Morphology Development of Polymer-Fullerene and Polymer-Polymer Solar Cells during Solution-Shearing Blade Coating

Journal Article · · Advanced Energy Materials
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [2];  [5];  [6];  [2];  [3]
  1. Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Chemical Engineering; SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States). Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL)
  2. SLAC National Accelerator Lab., Menlo Park, CA (United States). Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource (SSRL)
  3. Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Chemical Engineering
  4. Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Dept. of Chemical Engineering; Queen Mary Univ. of London (United Kingdom). School of Biological and Chemical Sciences and Materials Research Inst.
  5. Dresden Univ. of Technology (Germany). Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden
  6. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). Advanced Light Source (ALS)

In this work, the detailed morphology studies of polymer poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) (P3HT):fullerene(PCBM) and polymer(P3HT):polymer naphthalene diimide thiophene (PNDIT) solar cell are presented to understand the challenge for getting high performance all-polymer solar cells. The in situ X-ray scattering and optical interferometry and ex situ hard and soft X-ray scattering and imaging techniques are used to characterize the bulk heterojunction (BHJ) ink during drying and in dried state. The crystallization of P3HT polymers in P3HT:PCBM bulk heterojunction shows very different behavior compared to that of P3HT:PNDIT BHJ due to different mobilities of P3HT in the donor:acceptor glass. Supplemented by the ex situ grazing incidence X-ray diffraction and soft X-ray scattering, PNDIT has a lower tendency to form a mixed phase with P3HT than PCBM, which may be the key to inhibit the donor polymer crystallization process, thus creating preferred small phase separation between the donor and acceptor polymer.

Research Organization:
SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); US Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research (ONR)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-76SF00515; AC02-05CH11231; 6932623
OSTI ID:
1360189
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1440001
Journal Information:
Advanced Energy Materials, Vol. 6, Issue 22; ISSN 1614-6832
Publisher:
WileyCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 60 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (22)

All-Polymer Solar Cells Based on a Conjugated Polymer Containing Siloxane-Functionalized Side Chains with Efficiency over 10% journal November 2017
Achieving Balanced Crystallinity of Donor and Acceptor by Combining Blade-Coating and Ternary Strategies in Organic Solar Cells journal October 2018
Roll-to-Roll Printed Large-Area All-Polymer Solar Cells with 5% Efficiency Based on a Low Crystallinity Conjugated Polymer Blend journal March 2017
Toward High Efficiency Polymer Solar Cells: Rearranging the Backbone Units into a Readily Accessible Random Tetrapolymer journal October 2017
Printed Nonfullerene Organic Solar Cells with the Highest Efficiency of 9.5% journal January 2018
Carrier Transport and Recombination in Efficient “All-Small-Molecule” Solar Cells with the Nonfullerene Acceptor IDTBR journal April 2018
In Situ Analysis of Solvent and Additive Effects on Film Morphology Evolution in Spin-Cast Small-Molecule and Polymer Photovoltaic Materials journal May 2018
Higher Mobility and Carrier Lifetimes in Solution-Processable Small-Molecule Ternary Solar Cells with 11% Efficiency journal December 2018
Suppressing the excessive aggregation of nonfullerene acceptor in blade‐coated active layer by using n‐type polymer additive to achieve large‐area printed organic solar cells with efficiency over 15% journal December 2019
Challenge and Solution of Characterizing Glass Transition Temperature for Conjugated Polymers by Differential Scanning Calorimetry journal August 2019
High-Performance Green Solvent Processed Ternary Blended All-Polymer Solar Cells Enabled by Complementary Absorption and Improved Morphology journal August 2018
In Situ Structure Characterization in Slot‐Die‐Printed All‐Polymer Solar Cells with Efficiency Over 9% journal May 2019
The meniscus-guided deposition of semiconducting polymers journal February 2018
A generic green solvent concept boosting the power conversion efficiency of all-polymer solar cells to 11% journal January 2019
12.88% efficiency in doctor-blade coated organic solar cells through optimizing the surface morphology of a ZnO cathode buffer layer journal January 2019
A donor–acceptor semiconducting polymer with a random configuration for efficient, green-solvent-processable flexible solar cells journal January 2018
Deconstructing the behavior of donor–acceptor copolymers in solution & the melt: the case of PTB7 journal January 2019
Evolution of molecular aggregation in bar-coated non-fullerene organic solar cells journal January 2019
Benzodithiophene-modified terpolymer acceptors with reduced molecular planarity and crystallinity: improved performance and stability for all-polymer solar cells journal January 2019
Optimization of processing solvent and film morphology to achieve efficient non-fullerene polymer solar cells processed in air journal January 2020
In Situ Structure Characterization in Slot‐Die‐Printed All‐Polymer Solar Cells with Efficiency Over 9% journal May 2019
Bulk Heterojunction Morphologies with Atomistic Resolution from Coarse-Grain Solvent Evaporation Simulations journal March 2017

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