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Hu H, Ghasemi M, Peng Z, Zhang J, Rech JJ, You W, Yan H, Ade H. The Role of Demixing and Crystallization Kinetics on the Stability of Non-Fullerene Organic Solar Cells. ADVANCED MATERIALS (DEERFIELD BEACH, FLA.) 2020; 32:e2005348. [PMID: 33150638 DOI: 10.1002/adma.202005348] [Citation(s) in RCA: 27] [Impact Index Per Article: 6.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 08/07/2020] [Revised: 09/27/2020] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
With power conversion efficiency now over 17%, a long operational lifetime is essential for the successful application of organic solar cells. However, most non-fullerene acceptors can crystallize and destroy devices, yet the fundamental underlying thermodynamic and kinetic aspects of acceptor crystallization have received limited attention. Here, room-temperature (RT) diffusion coefficients of 3.4 × 10-23 and 2.0 × 10-22 are measured for ITIC-2Cl and ITIC-2F, two state-of-the-art non-fullerene acceptors. The low coefficients are enough to provide for kinetic stabilization of the morphology against demixing at RT. Additionally profound differences in crystallization characteristics are discovered between ITIC-2F and ITIC-2Cl. The differences as observed by secondary-ion mass spectrometry, differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), grazing-incidence wide-angle X-ray scattering, and microscopy can be related directly to device degradation and are attributed to the significantly different nucleation and growth rates, with a difference in the growth rate of a factor of 12 at RT. ITIC-4F and ITIC-4Cl exhibit similar characteristics. The results reveal the importance of diffusion coefficients and melting enthalpies in controlling the growth rates, and that differences in halogenation can drastically change crystallization kinetics and device stability. It is furthermore delineated how low nucleation density and large growth rates can be inferred from DSC and microscopy experiments which could be used to guide molecular design for stability.
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Affiliation(s)
- Huawei Hu
- Department of Physics and Organic and Carbon Electronics Laboratories (ORaCEL), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA
| | - Masoud Ghasemi
- Department of Physics and Organic and Carbon Electronics Laboratories (ORaCEL), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA
| | - Zhengxing Peng
- Department of Physics and Organic and Carbon Electronics Laboratories (ORaCEL), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA
| | - Jianquan Zhang
- Department of Chemistry and Hong Kong Branch of Chinese National Engineering Research Center for Tissue Restoration & Reconstruction, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China
| | - Jeromy James Rech
- Department of Chemistry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599, USA
| | - Wei You
- Department of Chemistry, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, 27599, USA
| | - He Yan
- Department of Chemistry and Hong Kong Branch of Chinese National Engineering Research Center for Tissue Restoration & Reconstruction, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST), Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China
| | - Harald Ade
- Department of Physics and Organic and Carbon Electronics Laboratories (ORaCEL), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC, 27695, USA
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Kolaczkowski MA, Garzón-Ruiz A, Patel A, Zhao Z, Guo Y, Navarro A, Liu Y. Design and Synthesis of Annulated Benzothiadiazoles via Dithiolate Formation for Ambipolar Organic Semiconductors. ACS APPLIED MATERIALS & INTERFACES 2020; 12:53328-53341. [PMID: 33170629 DOI: 10.1021/acsami.0c16056] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 06/11/2023]
Abstract
Substituted 2,1,3-benzothiadiazole (BTD) is a widely used electron acceptor unit for functional organic semiconductors. Difluorination or annulation on the 5,6-position of the benzene ring is among the most adapted chemical modifications to tune the electronic properties, though each sees its own limitations in regulating the frontier orbital levels. Herein, a hitherto unreported 5,6-annulated BTD acceptor, denoted as ssBTD, is designed and synthesized by incorporating an electron-withdrawing 2-(1,3-dithiol-2-ylidene)malononitrile moiety via aromatic nucleophilic substitution of the 5,6-difluoroBTD (ffBTD) precursor. Unlike the other reported BTD annulation strategies, this modification leads to the simultaneous decrease in both frontier orbital energies, a welcoming feature for photovoltaic applications. Incorporation of ssBTD into conjugated polymers results in materials boasting broad light absorption, dramatic solvatochromic and thermochromic responses (>100 nm shift and a band gap difference of ∼0.28 eV), and improved crystallinity in the solid state. Such physical properties are in accordance with the combined electron-withdrawing effect and significantly increased polarity associated with the ssBTD unit, as revealed by detailed theoretical studies. Furthermore, the thiolated ssBTD imbues the polymer with ambipolar charge transport property, in contrast to the ffBTD-based polymer, which transports holes only. While the low mobilities (10-4 to 10-5 cm2 V-1 s-1) could be further optimized, detailed studies validate that the thioannulated BTD is a versatile electron-accepting unit for the design of functional stimuli-responsive optoelectronic materials.
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Affiliation(s)
- Matthew A Kolaczkowski
- The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Department of Chemistry, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Andrés Garzón-Ruiz
- Department of Physical Chemistry, Faculty of Pharmacy, Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha, Cronista Francisco Ballesteros Gómez, Albacete 02071, Spain
| | - Akash Patel
- The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
- Department of Chemistry, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
| | - Zhiyuan Zhao
- Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, P. R. China
| | - Yunlong Guo
- Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, P. R. China
| | - Amparo Navarro
- Department of Physical and Analytical Chemistry, Faculty of Experimental Sciences, Universidad de Jaén, Campus Las Lagunillas, Jaén 23071, Spain
| | - Yi Liu
- The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, California 94720, United States
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Marmolejo-Valencia AF, Mata-Pinzón Z, Dominguez L, Amador-Bedolla C. Atomistic simulations of bulk heterojunctions to evaluate the structural and packing properties of new predicted donors in OPVs. Phys Chem Chem Phys 2019; 21:20315-20326. [PMID: 31495832 DOI: 10.1039/c9cp04041b] [Citation(s) in RCA: 6] [Impact Index Per Article: 1.2] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Indexed: 02/02/2023]
Abstract
Organic photovoltaic materials (OPVs), with low cost and structure flexibility, are of great interest and importance for their application in solar cell device development. However, the optimization of new OPV structures and the study of the structure arrangements and packing morphologies when materials are blended takes time and consumes raw materials, thus theoretical models could be of considerable value. In this work, we performed molecular dynamics simulations of present OPVs to understand the morphological packing of the donor-acceptor (DA) phases and DA heterojunction during evaporation and annealing processes, following inter and intramolecular properties like frontier orbitals, π-π stacking, coordination, distances, angles, and aggregation. Our considered donor molecules were selected from already proved experimental studies and also from predicted optimal compounds, designed through high throughput studies. The acceptor molecule employed in all our studied systems was PCBM ([6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester). Furthermore, we also analyze the influence of including different lateral aliphatic chains on the structural properties of the resulting DA packing morphologies. Our results can guide the design of new OPVs and subsequent studies applying charge transport and charge separation models.
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Affiliation(s)
- Andrés F Marmolejo-Valencia
- Facultad de Química, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México, Av. Universidad 3000, Coyoacán, CDMX 04510, Mexico.
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Yu J, Chen P, Koh CW, Wang H, Yang K, Zhou X, Liu B, Liao Q, Chen J, Sun H, Woo HY, Zhang S, Guo X. Phthalimide-Based High Mobility Polymer Semiconductors for Efficient Nonfullerene Solar Cells with Power Conversion Efficiencies over 13. ADVANCED SCIENCE (WEINHEIM, BADEN-WURTTEMBERG, GERMANY) 2019; 6:1801743. [PMID: 30693192 PMCID: PMC6343056 DOI: 10.1002/advs.201801743] [Citation(s) in RCA: 17] [Impact Index Per Article: 3.4] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Track Full Text] [Figures] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 10/04/2018] [Revised: 11/20/2018] [Indexed: 06/09/2023]
Abstract
Highly efficient nonfullerene polymer solar cells (PSCs) are developed based on two new phthalimide-based polymers phthalimide-difluorobenzothiadiazole (PhI-ffBT) and fluorinated phthalimide-ffBT (ffPhI-ffBT). Compared to all high-performance polymers reported, which are exclusively based on benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b']dithiophene (BDT), both PhI-ffBT and ffPhI-ffBT are BDT-free and feature a D-A1-D-A2 type backbone. Incorporating a second acceptor unit difluorobenzothiadiazole leads to polymers with low-lying highest occupied molecular orbital levels (≈-5.6 eV) and a complementary absorption with the narrow bandgap nonfullerene acceptor IT-4F. Moreover, these BDT-free polymers show substantially higher hole mobilities than BDT-based polymers, which are beneficial to charge transport and extraction in solar cells. The PSCs containing difluorinated phthalimide-based polymer ffPhI-ffBT achieve a substantial PCE of 12.74% and a large V oc of 0.94 V, and the PSCs containing phthalimide-based polymer PhI-ffBT show a further increased PCE of 13.31% with a higher J sc of 19.41 mA cm-2 and a larger fill factor of 0.76. The 13.31% PCE is the highest value except the widely studied BDT-based polymers and is also the highest among all benzothiadiazole-based polymers. The results demonstrate that phthalimides are excellent building blocks for enabling donor polymers with the state-of-the-art performance in nonfullerene PSCs and the BDT is not necessary for constructing such donor polymers.
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Affiliation(s)
- Jianwei Yu
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
- Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics (KLOFE) and Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM)Jiangsu National Synergetic Innovation Center for Advanced Materials (SICAM)Nanjing Tech University (NanjingTech)30 South Puzhu RoadNanjing211816China
| | - Peng Chen
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Chang Woo Koh
- Research Institute for Natural SciencesDepartment of ChemistryKorea UniversitySeoul136‐713South Korea
| | - Hang Wang
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
- Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics (KLOFE) and Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM)Jiangsu National Synergetic Innovation Center for Advanced Materials (SICAM)Nanjing Tech University (NanjingTech)30 South Puzhu RoadNanjing211816China
| | - Kun Yang
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Xin Zhou
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Bin Liu
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Qiaogan Liao
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Jianhua Chen
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Huiliang Sun
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
| | - Han Young Woo
- Research Institute for Natural SciencesDepartment of ChemistryKorea UniversitySeoul136‐713South Korea
| | - Shiming Zhang
- Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics (KLOFE) and Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM)Jiangsu National Synergetic Innovation Center for Advanced Materials (SICAM)Nanjing Tech University (NanjingTech)30 South Puzhu RoadNanjing211816China
| | - Xugang Guo
- Department of Materials Science and Engineering and The Shenzhen Key Laboratory for Printed Organic ElectronicsSouthern University of Science and TechnologyNo. 1088, Xueyuan RoadShenzhenGuangdong518055China
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