Issue 18, 2014

Novel metallo-dendrimers containing various Ru core ligands and dendritic thiophene arms for photovoltaic applications

Abstract

Three series of supramolecular mono-(i.e., Ru1G1, Ru1G2 and Ru1G3), bis-(i.e., BTRu2G1, BTRu2G2 and BTRu2G3) and tris-(i.e., TPARu3G1, TPARu3G2 and TPARu3G3) Ru-based dendritic complexes were synthesized. Their photophysical and electrochemical properties were investigated. These metallo-dendritic complexes covered a broad absorption range of 250–750 nm with optical bandgaps of 1.51–1.86 eV. The energy levels of the metallo-dendrimers can be effectively adjusted not only by different generations of dendritic thiophene arms but also by their π-conjugated core ligands bearing various electron donor (i.e., triphenylamine) and acceptor (i.e., benzothiadiazole) moieties. Due to the donor–acceptor effect, the bis-Ru-based dendrimers containing a benzothiadiazole electron-acceptor core ligand showed the highest power conversion efficiency (PCE) among these three series of metallo-dendrimers. The tris-Ru-based architecture with a triphenylamine electron-donor core ligand revealed moderate photovoltaic performance. Among the different generations (G1–G3) of dendrimers, the third generation (G3) possessed the highest PCE values in each series of Ru-based dendrimers. Hence, the third generation bis-‘Ru’-based dendrimer BTRu2G3 blended with PC70BM (1 : 3 w/w) showed the highest PCE value of 0.77% (without the aid of additives or annealing), which is the highest efficiency among all bulk hetero-junction (BHJ) solar cells containing metallo-dendrimers reported to date.

Graphical abstract: Novel metallo-dendrimers containing various Ru core ligands and dendritic thiophene arms for photovoltaic applications

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
28 Mar 2014
Accepted
22 May 2014
First published
23 May 2014

Polym. Chem., 2014,5, 5423-5435

Author version available

Novel metallo-dendrimers containing various Ru core ligands and dendritic thiophene arms for photovoltaic applications

R. Satapathy, M. Ramesh, H. Padhy, I.-Hung Chiang, C. Chu, K. Wei and H. Lin, Polym. Chem., 2014, 5, 5423 DOI: 10.1039/C4PY00444B

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