Issue 1, 2017

Ternary solar cells with a mixed face-on and edge-on orientation enable an unprecedented efficiency of 12.1%

Abstract

Ternary organic solar cells (OSCs), with a simple structure, can be easily adopted as sub-cells in a tandem design, thereby further enhancing the power conversion efficiency (PCE). Considering the potential to surpass the theoretical PCE limit in OSCs, we incorporated a benzo[1,2-b;4,5-b′]dithiophene-based small molecule into a poly(4,8-bis(5-(2-ethylhexyl)thiophen-2-yl)benzo[1,2-b;4,5-b′]dithiophene-2,6-diyl-alt-(4-(2-ethylhexyl)-3-fluorothieno[3,4-b]thiophene-)-2-carboxylate-2-6-diyl):[6,6]-phenyl-C71-butyric acid methyl ester host system. A hitherto unrealized PCE of 12.1% was achieved at the optimized composition of the ternary blend. The ternary blend surprisingly had a face-on and edge-on co-existent texture, which is far better than that of the face-on orientated host film. To the best of our knowledge, this intriguing result refutes for the first time a general paradigm that high-performance OSCs are unambiguously linked to face-on structures. Therefore, our study provides a new platform for refining the theoretical underpinning of multiple blending OSCs.

Graphical abstract: Ternary solar cells with a mixed face-on and edge-on orientation enable an unprecedented efficiency of 12.1%

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
29 Sept. 2016
Accepted
11 Nov. 2016
First published
11 Nov. 2016

Energy Environ. Sci., 2017,10, 258-265

Ternary solar cells with a mixed face-on and edge-on orientation enable an unprecedented efficiency of 12.1%

T. Kumari, S. M. Lee, S. Kang, S. Chen and C. Yang, Energy Environ. Sci., 2017, 10, 258 DOI: 10.1039/C6EE02851A

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