Optical, Electrical, and Magnetic Studies of Organic Solar Cells Based on Low Bandgap Copolymer with Spin ½ Radical Additives

Basel, Tek; Huynh, Uyen; Zheng, Tianyue; Xu, Tao; Yu, Luping; Vardeny, Z. Valy

doi:10.1002/adfm.201403191

Optical, Electrical, and Magnetic Studies of Organic Solar Cells Based on Low Bandgap Copolymer with Spin ½ Radical Additives

Journal Article · Wed Feb 18 00:00:00 EST 2015 · Advanced Functional Materials

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.201403191· OSTI ID:1464542

Basel, Tek ^[1]; Huynh, Uyen ^[1]; Zheng, Tianyue ^[2]; Xu, Tao ^[2]; Yu, Luping ^[2]; Vardeny, Z. Valy ^[1]

Department of Physics &, Astronomy University of Utah Salt Lake City UT 84112 USA
Department of Chemistry and James Franck Institute The University of Chicago Chicago IL 60637 USA

The charge photogeneration and recombination processes in organic photovoltaic solar cells based on blend of the low bandgap copolymer, PTB7 (fluorinated poly‐thienothiophene‐benzodithiophene) with C60‐PCBM using optical, electrical, and magnetic measurements in thin films and devices is studied. A variety of steady state optical and magneto‐optical techniques were employed, such as photoinduced absorption (PA), magneto‐PA, doping‐induced absorption, and PA‐detected magnetic resonance (PADMR); as well as picosecond time‐resolved PA. The charge polarons and triplet exciton dynamics in films of pristine PTB7, PTB7/fullerene donor–acceptor (D–A) blend is followed. It is found that a major loss mechanism that limits the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of PTB7‐based solar cell devices is the “back reaction” that leads to triplet exciton formation in the polymer donor from the photogenerated charge‐transfer excitons at the D–A interfaces. A method of suppressing this “back reaction” by adding spin½ radicals Galvinoxyl to the D–A blend is presented; this enhances the cell PCE by ≈30%. The same method is not effective for cells based on PTB7/C70‐PCBM blend, where high PCE is reached even without Galvinoxyl radical additives.

View Accepted Manuscript (Publisher)

Sponsoring Organization:: USDOE

Grant/Contract Number:: FG02-04ER46109

OSTI ID:: 1464542

Journal Information:: Advanced Functional Materials, Journal Name: Advanced Functional Materials Journal Issue: 12 Vol. 25; ISSN 1616-301X

Publisher:: Wiley Blackwell (John Wiley & Sons)Copyright Statement

Country of Publication:: Germany

Language:: English

References (41)

Nanomorphology and Charge Generation in Bulk Heterojunctions Based on Low-Bandgap Dithiophene Polymers with Different Bridging Atoms Morana, Mauro; Azimi, Hamed; Dennler, Gilles Advanced Functional Materials, Vol. 20, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.200900931	journal	March 2010
Photovoltaic Function and Exciton/Charge Transfer Dynamics in a Highly Efficient Semiconducting Copolymer Szarko, Jodi M.; Rolczynski, Brian S.; Lou, Sylvia J. Advanced Functional Materials, Vol. 24, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.201301820	journal	July 2013
Nongeminate and Geminate Recombination in PTB7:PCBM Solar Cells Foertig, Alexander; Kniepert, Juliane; Gluecker, Markus Advanced Functional Materials, Vol. 24, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1002/adfm.201302134	journal	September 2013
Optimizing Polymer Tandem Solar Cells Gilot, Jan; Wienk, Martijn M.; Janssen, René A. J. Advanced Materials, Vol. 22, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.200902398	journal	February 2010
For the Bright Future-Bulk Heterojunction Polymer Solar Cells with Power Conversion Efficiency of 7.4% Liang, Yongye; Xu, Zheng; Xia, Jiangbin Advanced Materials, Vol. 22, Issue 20, p. E135-E138 https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.200903528	journal	May 2010
25th Anniversary Article: Rise to Power - OPV-Based Solar Parks Krebs, Frederik C.; Espinosa, Nieves; Hösel, Markus Advanced Materials, Vol. 26, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.201302031	journal	October 2013
Absolute Measurement of Domain Composition and Nanoscale Size Distribution Explains Performance in PTB7:PC ₇₁ BM Solar Cells Collins, Brian A.; Li, Zhe; Tumbleston, John R. Advanced Energy Materials, Vol. 3, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1002/aenm.201200377	journal	October 2012
Characteristics and the effect of additives on the nanomorphology of PTB7/PC71BM composite films Ochiai, Shizuyasu; Imamura, Shogo; Kannappan, Santhakumar Current Applied Physics, Vol. 13 https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cap.2013.01.010	journal	July 2013
A New Class of Semiconducting Polymers for Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells with Exceptionally High Performance Liang, Yongye; Yu, Luping Accounts of Chemical Research, Vol. 43, Issue 9, p. 1227-1236 https://doi.org/10.1021/ar1000296	journal	September 2010
Triplet Exciton Generation in Bulk-Heterojunction Solar Cells Based on Endohedral Fullerenes Liedtke, Moritz; Sperlich, Andreas; Kraus, Hannes Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol. 133, Issue 23 https://doi.org/10.1021/ja2025432	journal	June 2011
Improved High-Efficiency Organic Solar Cells via Incorporation of a Conjugated Polyelectrolyte Interlayer Seo, Jung Hwa; Gutacker, Andrea; Sun, Yanming Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol. 133, Issue 22, p. 8416-8419 https://doi.org/10.1021/ja2037673	journal	June 2011
Effects of Additives on the Morphology of Solution Phase Aggregates Formed by Active Layer Components of High-Efficiency Organic Solar Cells Lou, Sylvia J.; Szarko, Jodi M.; Xu, Tao Journal of the American Chemical Society, Vol. 133, Issue 51 https://doi.org/10.1021/ja2085564	journal	December 2011
Photoinduced Charge Transfer and Polaron Dynamics in Polymer and Hybrid Photovoltaic Thin Films: Organic vs Inorganic Acceptors Noone, Kevin M.; Subramaniyan, Selvam; Zhang, Qifeng The Journal of Physical Chemistry C, Vol. 115, Issue 49 https://doi.org/10.1021/jp207514v	journal	November 2011
Kinetic Studies of Geminate Polaron Pair Recombination, Dissociation, and Efficient Triplet Exciton Formation in PC:PCBM Organic Photovoltaic Blends Snedden, Edward W.; Monkman, Andrew P.; Dias, Fernando B. The Journal of Physical Chemistry C, Vol. 116, Issue 7 https://doi.org/10.1021/jp208820g	journal	February 2012
Influence of Solvent and Solvent Additive on the Morphology of PTB7 Films Probed via X-ray Scattering Guo, Shuai; Herzig, Eva M.; Naumann, Anna The Journal of Physical Chemistry B, Vol. 118, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1021/jp410075a	journal	December 2013
Role of Molecular Architecture in Organic Photovoltaic Cells Venkataraman, D.; Yurt, Serkan; Venkatraman, B. Harihara The Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters, Vol. 1, Issue 6 https://doi.org/10.1021/jz1000819	journal	February 2010
Conjugated Donor−Acceptor Copolymer Semiconductors with Large Intramolecular Charge Transfer: Synthesis, Optical Properties, Electrochemistry, and Field Effect Carrier Mobility of Thienopyrazine-Based Copolymers Zhu, Yan; Champion, Richard D.; Jenekhe, Samson A. Macromolecules, Vol. 39, Issue 25 https://doi.org/10.1021/ma061861g	journal	December 2006
Synthesis of 5 H -Dithieno[3,2- b :2′,3′- d ]pyran as an Electron-Rich Building Block for Donor–Acceptor Type Low-Bandgap Polymers Dou, Letian; Chen, Chun-Chao; Yoshimura, Ken Macromolecules, Vol. 46, Issue 9 https://doi.org/10.1021/ma400452j	journal	April 2013
Effective Work Function Modulation of Graphene/Carbon Nanotube Composite Films As Transparent Cathodes for Organic Optoelectronics Huang, Jen-Hsien; Fang, Jheng-Hao; Liu, Chung-Chun ACS Nano, Vol. 5, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1021/nn201253w	journal	July 2011
Molecular Order in High-Efficiency Polymer/Fullerene Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells Hammond, Matthew R.; Kline, R. Joseph; Herzing, Andrew A. ACS Nano, Vol. 5, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1021/nn202951e	journal	September 2011
The role of spin in the kinetic control of recombination in organic photovoltaics Rao, Akshay; Chow, Philip C. Y.; Gélinas, Simon Nature, Vol. 500, Issue 7463 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature12339	journal	August 2013
Structural correlations in the generation of polaron pairs in low-bandgap polymers for photovoltaics Tautz, Raphael; Da Como, Enrico; Limmer, Thomas Nature Communications, Vol. 3, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms1967	journal	January 2012
Spin-enhanced organic bulk heterojunction photovoltaic solar cells Zhang, Ye; Basel, Tek P.; Gautam, Bhoj R. Nature Communications, Vol. 3, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms2057	journal	January 2012
A polymer tandem solar cell with 10.6% power conversion efficiency You, Jingbi; Dou, Letian; Yoshimura, Ken Nature Communications, Vol. 4, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms2411	journal	February 2013
High-efficiency solution processable polymer photovoltaic cells by self-organization of polymer blends Li, Gang; Shrotriya, Vishal; Huang, Jinsong Nature Materials, Vol. 4, Issue 11, p. 864-868 https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat1500	journal	October 2005
Hot charge-transfer excitons set the time limit for charge separation at donor/acceptor interfaces in organic photovoltaics Jailaubekov, Askat E.; Willard, Adam P.; Tritsch, John R. Nature Materials, Vol. 12, Issue 1 https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3500	journal	December 2012
A general relationship between disorder, aggregation and charge transport in conjugated polymers Noriega, Rodrigo; Rivnay, Jonathan; Vandewal, Koen Nature Materials, Vol. 12, Issue 11 https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat3722	journal	August 2013
Polymer solar cells Li, Gang; Zhu, Rui; Yang, Yang Nature Photonics, Vol. 6, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1038/nphoton.2012.11	journal	February 2012
Charge generation in polymer–fullerene bulk-heterojunction solar cells Gao, Feng; Inganäs, Olle Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys., Vol. 16, Issue 38 https://doi.org/10.1039/C4CP01814A	journal	January 2014
Charge transfer state in highly efficient polymer–fullerene bulk heterojunction solar cells Piliego, Claudia; Loi, Maria Antonietta Journal of Materials Chemistry, Vol. 22, Issue 10 https://doi.org/10.1039/c2jm15027a	journal	January 2012
High-efficiency photovoltaic devices based on annealed poly(3-hexylthiophene) and 1-(3-methoxycarbonyl)-propyl-1- phenyl-(6,6)C61 blends Reyes-Reyes, Marisol; Kim, Kyungkon; Carroll, David L. Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 87, Issue 8 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.2006986	journal	August 2005
Study of photoexcitations in poly(3-hexylthiophene) for photovoltaic applications Hukic-Markosian, Golda; Basel, Tek; Singh, Sanjeev Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 100, Issue 21 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4720177	journal	May 2012
Recombination pathways in polymer:fullerene photovoltaics observed through spin polarization measurements Etherington, Marc K.; Wang, Jianpu; Chow, Philip C. Y. Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 104, Issue 6 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.4865203	journal	February 2014
Two‐layer organic photovoltaic cell Tang, C. W. Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 48, Issue 2 https://doi.org/10.1063/1.96937	journal	January 1986
Illumination-induced metastable polaron-supporting state in poly( p -phenylene vinylene) films Drori, T.; Gershman, E.; Sheng, C. X. Physical Review B, Vol. 76, Issue 3 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.76.033203	journal	July 2007
Two-step charge photogeneration dynamics in polymer/fullerene blends for photovoltaic applications Singh, Sanjeev; Pandit, Bill; Basel, Tek P. Physical Review B, Vol. 85, Issue 20 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.85.205206	journal	May 2012
Magnetic field effect on excited-state spectroscopies of π -conjugated polymer films Gautam, Bhoj R.; Nguyen, Tho D.; Ehrenfreund, Eitan Physical Review B, Vol. 85, Issue 20 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.85.205207	journal	May 2012
Polaron Spin-Lattice Relaxation Time in π -Conjugated Polymers from Optically Detected Magnetic Resonance Yang, C. G.; Ehrenfreund, E.; Vardeny, Z. V. Physical Review Letters, Vol. 99, Issue 15 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.99.157401	journal	October 2007
The Role of Driving Energy and Delocalized States for Charge Separation in Organic Semiconductors Bakulin, A. A.; Rao, A.; Pavelyev, V. G. Science, Vol. 335, Issue 6074 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1217745	journal	February 2012
Polymer Photovoltaic Cells: Enhanced Efficiencies via a Network of Internal Donor-Acceptor Heterojunctions Yu, G.; Gao, J.; Hummelen, J. C. Science, Vol. 270, Issue 5243, p. 1789-1791 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.270.5243.1789	journal	December 1995
Two-Dimensional Electronic Excitations in Self-Assembled Conjugated Polymer Nanocrystals Österbacka, R. Science, Vol. 287, Issue 5454 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.287.5454.839	journal	February 2000

Similar Records

Ultrafast Transient Spectroscopy of Polymer/Fullerene Blends for Organic Photovoltaic Applications

Journal Article · Thu Feb 28 19:00:00 EST 2013 · Materials · OSTI ID:1628437

Structure, dynamics and power conversion efficiency correlations in a new low bandgap polymer : PCBM solar cell.

Journal Article · Wed Jan 20 23:00:00 EST 2010 · J. Phys. Chem. C. · OSTI ID:972186

Luminescent GdVO{sub 4}:Sm{sup 3+} quantum dots enhance power conversion efficiency of bulk heterojunction polymer solar cells by Förster resonance energy transfer

Journal Article · Mon Jul 11 00:00:00 EDT 2016 · Applied Physics Letters · OSTI ID:22590615

Optical, Electrical, and Magnetic Studies of Organic Solar Cells Based on Low Bandgap Copolymer with Spin ½ Radical Additives

Citation Formats

References (41)

Similar Records

Related Subjects