Issue 8, 2021

Progress and prospects of the morphology of non-fullerene acceptor based high-efficiency organic solar cells

Abstract

With the development of non-fullerene acceptors (NFAs), the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of organic solar cells (OSCs) has been continuously improved and has exceeded 18%. A critical step to realize high-efficiency devices is to control the complex non-equilibrium morphology of the photoactive layer, to match the domain sizes with excitons, carriers, and other photoelectron physical kinetics, and to suppress the loss channels. Multiple factors affect the blended film morphology, which is in close relation to the physical and chemical properties of the donor/acceptor materials and the film-forming conditions that provide leverage for morphology optimization. This article reviews the important morphological characteristics and recent research progress of NFA-based OSCs, including indacenodithiophene (IDT)- and Y6-based π-conjugated molecular systems and n-type π-conjugated polymers, and discusses the effects of material miscibility, crystallinity, chemical structure, blending strategy, and processing conditions on the film morphology. The recently emerged high performance Y6-based NFAs are paid special attention, and the structure–property relationship has been constructed from the perspective of the crystal structure and phase separation. We wish that this short review can provide useful information and guidance for the morphology optimization of NFA-based OSCs, and wish that the discussion could help to resolve the morphological issues for new materials to achieve higher efficiency devices.

Graphical abstract: Progress and prospects of the morphology of non-fullerene acceptor based high-efficiency organic solar cells

Article information

Article type
Review Article
Submitted
23 apr 2021
Accepted
17 jun 2021
First published
17 jun 2021

Energy Environ. Sci., 2021,14, 4341-4357

Progress and prospects of the morphology of non-fullerene acceptor based high-efficiency organic solar cells

L. Zhu, M. Zhang, W. Zhong, S. Leng, G. Zhou, Y. Zou, X. Su, H. Ding, P. Gu, F. Liu and Y. Zhang, Energy Environ. Sci., 2021, 14, 4341 DOI: 10.1039/D1EE01220G

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements