No abstract

Aryl borates lie at the heart of carbon–carbon bond couplings, and they are widely applied to the synthesis of functional materials, pharmaceutical compounds, and natural products. Currently, synthetic methods for aryl borates are mostly limited to metal-catalyzed routes, and nonmetallic strategies remain comparatively underdeveloped. Herein, we report a mild, scalable, visible-light-induced cross-coupling between aryl dibenzothiophenium triflate salts and bis­(catecholato)-diboron for the construction of C–B bonds in the absence of base, transition metal–ligand complex, or photoredox catalyst. Mechanistic studies reveal that this transformation is achieved through an electron donor–acceptor (EDA) complex activation in the absence of a catalyst. The mild reaction conditions allow the preparation of aromatic borates in good yields with excellent functional group tolerance. This photochemical protocol was also successfully applied to the late-stage modification of natural products and the synthesis of a drug intermediate, greatly demonstrating broadened utility.

No abstract

Cathodic interface layers are important in determining the charge carrier collection and performance of polymer solar cells (PSCs). In this work, 6‐aminocaproic acid (6‐ACA) is successfully incorporated into sol–gel‐derived zinc oxide (ZnO) to form 6‐ACA‐ZnO that can be used as a cathodic interface layer (CIL) in PM6:Y6 inverted polymer solar cells (i‐PSCs). The work function of ZnO films can be reduced from 4.53 to 4.10 eV, thus effectively increasing the built‐in electric field and enhancing the electron extraction efficiency. Furthermore, the partial substitution of undercoordinated oxygen vacancy by nitrogen atoms can effectively passivate the interface defects, thereby substantially increasing the electron mobility and conductivity to facilitate electron transport and reduce the carrier recombination loss. The i‐PSCs based on 6‐ACA‐ZnO exhibit a power conversion efficiency (PCE) up to 16.50%, which is remarkably higher than the 15.30% of devices based on pristine ZnO. 6‐ACA‐ZnO can also be successfully applied to other nonfullerene and fullerene‐based i‐PSCs. The results indicate that 6‐ACA‐ZnO can be used as CILs to effectively improve the PCE of i‐PSCs.