Status and prospects for ternary organic photovoltaics

Lu, Luyao; Kelly, Mary Allison; You, Wei; Yu, Luping

doi:10.1038/nphoton.2015.128

Cited by 534 publications

(426 citation statements)

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“…3,4,[19][20][21][22][23]24 However, simultaneous increase in the Voc, Jsc and FF is a challenge in the ternary approach because of the trade-off between photocurrent and voltage. 23,25,26 Reports show ternary blends using fullerene acceptors, where the Voc is increased using a second acceptor (A2) with a higher electron affinity (EA) than A1; 23,27-29 however, very few examples of two-acceptor ternary blend devices could surpass the overall efficiency of their respective binary blends. 24,30,31 Therefore, the majority of studies on ternary solar cells have focused on multi-polymer donor:acceptor blends.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…24,30,31 Therefore, the majority of studies on ternary solar cells have focused on multi-polymer donor:acceptor blends. 19,23,[27][28][29] However, the mixing of two polymers is more complicated due to both a lack of entropic driving force for mixing, and the potential for strong intermolecular attractions between polymer chains. 32 Therefore, a ternary approach, wherein small molecule acceptors are mixed in a donor:multi-acceptor blend (D:A1:A2, where D is donor polymer, A1 is the primary acceptor and A2 is a second acceptor), has the potential to offer morphological advantages.…”

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confidence: 99%

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Reducing the efficiency–stability–cost gap of organic photovoltaics with highly efficient and stable small molecule acceptor ternary solar cells

et al. 2016

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Technological deployment of organic photovoltaic modules requires improvements in device light-conversion efficiency and stability while keeping material costs low. Here we demonstrate highly efficient and stable solar cells using a ternary approach, wherein two non-fullerene acceptors are combined with both a scalable and affordable donor polymer, poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT), and a high efficiency, low band-gap polymer in a single-layer bulk-heterojunction devices. The addition of a strongly absorbing small molecule acceptor into a P3HT-based non-fullerene blend increases the device efficiency up to 7.7 ± 0.1% without any solvent additives. The improvement is assigned to changes in microstructure that reduces charge recombination and increases the photovoltage, and to improved light harvesting across the visible region. The stability of P3HT-based devices in ambient conditions is also significantly improved relative to polymer:fullerene devices. Combined with a low band gap donor polymer (PBDTTT-EFT, also known as PCE10), the two mixed acceptors also lead to solar cells with 11.0 ± 0.4% efficiency and a high open-circuit voltage of 1.03 ± 0.01V.Currently, the materials used in organic photovoltaics (OPV) are dominated by fullerene acceptors in combination with low band gap donor polymers which typically require complex and multi-step syntheses. [1][2][3][4][5] However, the commercialization of OPV requires the availability of inexpensive materials in large quantities such as poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT). P3HT is readily scalable via flow or micro-reactor synthesis, even using 'green' solvents, whilst retaining a high degree of control over molecular weight and regioregularity. 6 The P3HT:60PCBM blend exhibits one of the most robust microstructures within OPV. [7][8][9] However, it has a limited open-circuit voltage (Voc) and short-circuit current (Jsc) in photovoltaic devices. 10 We have recently shown that solar cells using an alternative small molecule non-fullerene acceptor (NFA), IDTBR, when mixed with P3HT, can achieve power conversion efficiencies of up to 6.4%. 11 These results have revived interest in the use of P3HT for high performing devices and non-fullerene acceptors. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18] The combination of stability, cost and performance for P3HT:NFA devices, make them a compelling choice for commercialization of OPV compared to devices using fullerenes, for which the high costs and energy involved are prohibitive for large scale production.Recently, multi-component heterojunctions (ternary or more) have emerged as a promising strategy to overcome the power conversion efficiency (PCE) bottleneck associated with binary bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. 3,4,[19][20][21][22][23]24 However, simultaneous increase in the Voc, Jsc and FF is a challenge in the ternary approach because of the trade-off between photocurrent and voltage. 23,25,26 Reports show ternary blends using fullerene acceptors, where the Voc is increased using a second acceptor (A2) with a higher electron affin...

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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confidence: 99%

Reducing the efficiency–stability–cost gap of organic photovoltaics with highly efficient and stable small molecule acceptor ternary solar cells

et al. 2016

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“…Up to now, several excellent reviews have summarized the progress in ternary solar cells based on their unique insights [8,[15][16][17][18][19][20]. So in this article we present a review mainly focused on the newly reported work concerning about ternary blend PSCs.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Perspective of a new trend in organic photovoltaic: ternary blend polymer solar cells

2016

Sci. China Mater.

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In the past few years, ternary polymer solar cells (PSCs) have emerged as a promising structure to simultaneously improve all solar cell parameters compared with traditional binary PSCs. The third component in ternary PSCs can play versatile functions to enhance the device performance. In this review, we summarize the design rules for fabricating high-performance ternary PSCs and introduce the recent progress in this field. In addition, the characterization methods for determining the role of the third component played in ternary PSCs are described.

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“…[60][61][62][63] Phenyl-C 61 -butyric acid methyl ester (PC 61 BM; an organic electron-acceptor) 64 is soluble in organic solvents where poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT; an organic electron-donor) is blended over a range of concentrations to prepare thin films with a bulk heterojunction structure. [65][66][67][68][69][70] An OPV based on phenyl-C 71 -butyric acid methyl ester (PC 671 BM) with an n-type conjugated polymer, poly (4,8-…”

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confidence: 99%

Nanocarbons as Electron Donors and Acceptors in Photoinduced Electron-Transfer Reactions

Fukuzumi

2017

ECS J. Solid State Sci. Technol.

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Nanocarbons composed of hybridized sp2 carbons such as fullerenes, carbon nanotubes (CNTs), carbon nanohorns (CNHs) and graphene have been successfully utilized as electron acceptors in electron donor-acceptor hybrids for photoinduced electron-transfer reactions to mimic well the function of the photosynthetic reaction center. However, sp2 hybridized nanocarbons can also be used as electron donors when higher fullerenes such as C76 and C78 or endohedral metallofullerenes are employed or when nanocarbons are combined with relatively strong electron acceptors. This paper focuses on photoinduced electron-transfer reactions of nanocarbons including fullerenes, CNTs, CNHs and graphene, which act as not only as electron acceptors but also as electron donors with strong electron acceptors such as tetracyanoethylene (TCNE) and tetracyano-p-quinodimethan (TCNQ) to produce the radical cations efficiently because of small reorganization energies of electron transfer. Alternatively the oxidizing ability of electron acceptors was enhanced by binding Lewis acids to the radical anions, which enabled to oxidize nanocarbons. The important roles of nanocarbons such as fullerenes, carbon nanotubes and graphenes on the stability of rapidly emerging perovskite based solar cells with high power conversion efficiency have also been discussed in this paper.

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Status and prospects for ternary organic photovoltaics

Cited by 534 publications

References 95 publications

Reducing the efficiency–stability–cost gap of organic photovoltaics with highly efficient and stable small molecule acceptor ternary solar cells

Reducing the efficiency–stability–cost gap of organic photovoltaics with highly efficient and stable small molecule acceptor ternary solar cells

Perspective of a new trend in organic photovoltaic: ternary blend polymer solar cells

Nanocarbons as Electron Donors and Acceptors in Photoinduced Electron-Transfer Reactions

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