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Title: Efficient and thermally stable organic solar cells based on small molecule donor and polymer acceptor

Abstract

Efficient organic solar cells (OSCs) often use combination of polymer donor and small molecule acceptor. Herein we demonstrate efficient and thermally stable OSCs with combination of small molecule donor and polymer acceptor, which is expected to expand the research field of OSCs. Typical small molecule donors show strong intermolecular interactions and high crystallinity, and consequently do not match polymer acceptors because of large-size phase separation. We develop a small molecule donor with suppressed π-π stacking between molecular backbones by introducing large steric hindrance. As the result, the OSC exhibits small-size phase separation in the active layer and shows a power conversion efficiency of 8.0%. Moreover, this OSC exhibits much improved thermal stability, i.e. maintaining 89% of its initial efficiency after thermal annealing the active layer at 180 °C for 7 days. These results indicate a different kind of efficient and stable OSCs.

Authors:
 [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [4];  [5]; ORCiD logo [4];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [3];  [3]
  1. State Key Laboratory of Polymer Physics and Chemistry, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, P. R. China
  2. State Key Laboratory of Polymer Physics and Chemistry, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun, China; University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei, China
  3. State Key Laboratory of Polymer Physics and Chemistry, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun, China
  4. Key Laboratory for Functional Polymer Materials and Centre for Nanoscale Science and Technology, Institute of Polymer Chemistry, College of Chemistry, Nankai University, Tianjin, China
  5. State Key Laboratory for Mechanical Behavior of Materials, Xi’an Jiaotong University, Xi’an, China
Publication Date:
Research Org.:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Org.:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC); National Key Research and Development Program of China; MOST and Strategic Priority Research Program of Chinese Academy of Sciences
OSTI Identifier:
1624168
Grant/Contract Number:  
AC02-05CH11231; 21625403; 51873204; 21875244; 21504066; 21534003; 2018YFE0100600; XDB12010200
Resource Type:
Accepted Manuscript
Journal Name:
Nature Communications
Additional Journal Information:
Journal Volume: 10; Journal Issue: 1; Journal ID: ISSN 2041-1723
Publisher:
Nature Publishing Group
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Subject:
Science & Technology - Other Topics

Citation Formats

Zhang, Zijian, Miao, Junhui, Ding, Zicheng, Kan, Bin, Lin, Baojun, Wan, Xiangjian, Ma, Wei, Chen, Yongsheng, Long, Xiaojing, Dou, Chuandong, Zhang, Jidong, Liu, Jun, and Wang, Lixiang. Efficient and thermally stable organic solar cells based on small molecule donor and polymer acceptor. United States: N. p., 2019. Web. doi:10.1038/s41467-019-10984-6.
Zhang, Zijian, Miao, Junhui, Ding, Zicheng, Kan, Bin, Lin, Baojun, Wan, Xiangjian, Ma, Wei, Chen, Yongsheng, Long, Xiaojing, Dou, Chuandong, Zhang, Jidong, Liu, Jun, & Wang, Lixiang. Efficient and thermally stable organic solar cells based on small molecule donor and polymer acceptor. United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-10984-6
Zhang, Zijian, Miao, Junhui, Ding, Zicheng, Kan, Bin, Lin, Baojun, Wan, Xiangjian, Ma, Wei, Chen, Yongsheng, Long, Xiaojing, Dou, Chuandong, Zhang, Jidong, Liu, Jun, and Wang, Lixiang. Mon . "Efficient and thermally stable organic solar cells based on small molecule donor and polymer acceptor". United States. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-019-10984-6. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1624168.
@article{osti_1624168,
title = {Efficient and thermally stable organic solar cells based on small molecule donor and polymer acceptor},
author = {Zhang, Zijian and Miao, Junhui and Ding, Zicheng and Kan, Bin and Lin, Baojun and Wan, Xiangjian and Ma, Wei and Chen, Yongsheng and Long, Xiaojing and Dou, Chuandong and Zhang, Jidong and Liu, Jun and Wang, Lixiang},
abstractNote = {Efficient organic solar cells (OSCs) often use combination of polymer donor and small molecule acceptor. Herein we demonstrate efficient and thermally stable OSCs with combination of small molecule donor and polymer acceptor, which is expected to expand the research field of OSCs. Typical small molecule donors show strong intermolecular interactions and high crystallinity, and consequently do not match polymer acceptors because of large-size phase separation. We develop a small molecule donor with suppressed π-π stacking between molecular backbones by introducing large steric hindrance. As the result, the OSC exhibits small-size phase separation in the active layer and shows a power conversion efficiency of 8.0%. Moreover, this OSC exhibits much improved thermal stability, i.e. maintaining 89% of its initial efficiency after thermal annealing the active layer at 180 °C for 7 days. These results indicate a different kind of efficient and stable OSCs.},
doi = {10.1038/s41467-019-10984-6},
journal = {Nature Communications},
number = 1,
volume = 10,
place = {United States},
year = {Mon Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2019},
month = {Mon Jul 22 00:00:00 EDT 2019}
}

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journal, October 2014


26 mA cm−2 Jsc from organic solar cells with a low-bandgap nonfullerene acceptor
journal, November 2017


On the Glass Transition of Polymer Semiconductors and Its Impact on Polymer Solar Cell Stability
journal, March 2015


Molecular Orientation and Phase Separation by Controlling Chain Segment and Molecule Movement in P3HT/N2200 Blends
journal, September 2016


Hierarchical Morphology Stability under Multiple Stresses in Organic Solar Cells
journal, January 2019


Solution-Processed and High-Performance Organic Solar Cells Using Small Molecules with a Benzodithiophene Unit
journal, May 2013

  • Zhou, Jiaoyan; Zuo, Yi; Wan, Xiangjian
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  • DOI: 10.1021/ja403318y

n-Type Semiconducting Naphthalene Diimide-Perylene Diimide Copolymers: Controlling Crystallinity, Blend Morphology, and Compatibility Toward High-Performance All-Polymer Solar Cells
journal, March 2015

  • Hwang, Ye-Jin; Earmme, Taeshik; Courtright, Brett A. E.
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  • DOI: 10.1021/ja513260w

Series of Multifluorine Substituted Oligomers for Organic Solar Cells with Efficiency over 9% and Fill Factor of 0.77 by Combination Thermal and Solvent Vapor Annealing
journal, June 2016

  • Wang, Jin-Liang; Liu, Kai-Kai; Yan, Jun
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Hierarchical Nanomorphologies Promote Exciton Dissociation in Polymer/Fullerene Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells
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Molecular helices as electron acceptors in high-performance bulk heterojunction solar cells
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Polymer solar cells
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Robust nonfullerene solar cells approaching unity external quantum efficiency enabled by suppression of geminate recombination
journal, May 2018


Fine-tuning of the chemical structure of photoactive materials for highly efficient organic photovoltaics
journal, October 2018


Polymer Photovoltaic Cells: Enhanced Efficiencies via a Network of Internal Donor-Acceptor Heterojunctions
journal, December 1995


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