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  • Accepted Manuscript: First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates

Title: First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates

The performance of bulk organic and hybrid organic-inorganic heterojunction photovoltaics is often limited by high carrier recombination arising from strongly bound excitons and low carrier mobility. Structuring materials to minimize the length scales required for exciton separation and carrier collection is therefore a promising approach for improving efficiency. In this work, first-principles computations are employed to design and characterize a new class of photovoltaic materials composed of layered transition metal phosphates (TMPs) covalently bound to organic absorber molecules to form nanostructured superlattices. Using a combination of transition metal substitution and organic functionalization, the electronic structure of these materials is systematically tuned to design a new hybrid photovoltaic material predicted to exhibit very low recombination due to the presence of a local electric field and spatially isolated, high mobility, two-dimensional electron and hole conducting channels. Furthermore, this material is predicted to have a large open-circuit voltage of 1.7 V. Here, this work suggests that hybrid TMPs constitute an interesting class of materials for further investigation in the search for achieving high efficiency, high power, and low cost photo Zirconium phosphate was chosen, in part, due to previous experiment voltaics.
Authors:
ORCiD logo [1] ;  [1]
+ Show Author Affiliations
  1. Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States). Dept. of Mechanical Engineering
Publication Date:
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0001299; FG02-09ER46577
Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Scientific Reports
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 7; Journal Issue: 1; Journal ID: ISSN 2045-2322
Publisher:
Nature Publishing Group
Research Org:
Massachusetts Inst. of Technology (MIT), Cambridge, MA (United States)
Sponsoring Org:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES) (SC-22)
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
14 SOLAR ENERGY
OSTI Identifier:
1368357
Citation Formats
Lentz, Levi C., and Kolpak, Alexie M.. First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates. United States: N. p., Web. doi:10.1038/s41598-017-01296-0.
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Lentz, Levi C., & Kolpak, Alexie M.. First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates. United States. doi:10.1038/s41598-017-01296-0.
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Lentz, Levi C., and Kolpak, Alexie M.. 2017. "First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates". United States. doi:10.1038/s41598-017-01296-0. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1368357.
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@article{osti_1368357,
title = {First-principles design of nanostructured hybrid photovoltaics based on layered transition metal phosphates},
author = {Lentz, Levi C. and Kolpak, Alexie M.},
abstractNote = {The performance of bulk organic and hybrid organic-inorganic heterojunction photovoltaics is often limited by high carrier recombination arising from strongly bound excitons and low carrier mobility. Structuring materials to minimize the length scales required for exciton separation and carrier collection is therefore a promising approach for improving efficiency. In this work, first-principles computations are employed to design and characterize a new class of photovoltaic materials composed of layered transition metal phosphates (TMPs) covalently bound to organic absorber molecules to form nanostructured superlattices. Using a combination of transition metal substitution and organic functionalization, the electronic structure of these materials is systematically tuned to design a new hybrid photovoltaic material predicted to exhibit very low recombination due to the presence of a local electric field and spatially isolated, high mobility, two-dimensional electron and hole conducting channels. Furthermore, this material is predicted to have a large open-circuit voltage of 1.7 V. Here, this work suggests that hybrid TMPs constitute an interesting class of materials for further investigation in the search for achieving high efficiency, high power, and low cost photo Zirconium phosphate was chosen, in part, due to previous experiment voltaics.},
doi = {10.1038/s41598-017-01296-0},
journal = {Scientific Reports},
number = 1,
volume = 7,
place = {United States},
year = {2017},
month = {4}
}
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