Title: Fullerene derivative induced morphology of bulk heterojunction blends: PIPCP:PC ₆₁ BM

Abstract

The performance of organic solar cells (OSCs) depends crucially on the morphology in bulk heterojunctions (BHJs), including the degree of crystallinity of the polymer and the amount of each material phase: aggregated donor, aggregated acceptor, and molecular mixed donor:acceptor phase. In this paper, we report the BHJ morphology of as-cast blend films incorporating the polymer PIPCP as the donor and [6,6]-phenyl-C₆₁-butyric acid methyl ester (PC₆₁BM) as the acceptor. Tracking the scattering intensity of PC₆₁BM as a function of PC₆₁BM concentration shows that PC₆₁BM aggregates into donor-rich domains and there is little to no phase where the PC₆₁BM and PIPCP are intimately mixed. We further find that on blending the scattering peak due to PIPCP ordering along the backbone increases with decreasing PIPCP fraction, which is attributed to improved ordering of PIPCP due to the presence of PC₆₁BM. Our results suggest that the improved ordering of PIPCP along the backbone (consistent with an increased conjugation length) with blending contributes to the observed low open-circuit voltage energy loss.

Authors:

Huang, Tzu-Yen  ^[1];

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• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0001-8473-9459"

Yan, Hongping ^[2]; Abdelsamie, Maged  ^[1];

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• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0002-4631-5409"

Savikhin, Victoria ^[3]; Schneider, Sebastian A. ^[4]; Ran, Niva A. ^[5]; Nguyen, Thuc-Quyen ^[5]; Bazan, Guillermo C.  ^[5];

• Search DOE PAGES for author "Bazan, Guillermo C."
• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0002-2537-0310"

Toney, Michael F.  ^[1]

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• Search DOE PAGES for ORCID "0000-0002-7513-1166"

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+ Show Author Affiliations

1. Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, USA
2. Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, USA, Department of Chemical Engineering
3. Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, USA, Department of Electrical Engineering
4. Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, USA, Department of Chemistry
5. Center for Polymers and Organic Solids, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of California—Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, USA

Publication Date:

Wed Jan 30 00:00:00 EST 2019

Research Org.:

SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC), Menlo Park, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Org.:

USDOE

OSTI Identifier:

1492906

Alternate Identifier(s):

OSTI ID: 1507156

Grant/Contract Number:  

N00014-14-1-0580; N00014-16-1-2520; N00014-16-1-2678; AC02-76SF00515; ECCS-1542152; 105-2917-I-564-044

Resource Type:

Published Article

Journal Name:

RSC Advances

Additional Journal Information:

Journal Name: RSC Advances Journal Volume: 9 Journal Issue: 8; Journal ID: ISSN 2046-2069

Publisher:

Royal Society of Chemistry

Country of Publication:

United Kingdom

Language:

English

Subject:

37 INORGANIC, ORGANIC, PHYSICAL, AND ANALYTICAL CHEMISTRY