The role of alkane dithiols in controlling polymer crystallization in small band gap polymer:Fullerene solar cells

✍ Scribed by Tiziano Agostinelli; Toby A. M. Ferenczi; E. Pires; Samuel Foster; Andrea Maurano; Christian Müller; Amy Ballantyne; Mark Hampton; Samuele Lilliu; Mariano Campoy-Quiles; Hamed Azimi; Mauro Morana; Donal D. C. Bradley; James Durrant; J. Emyr Macdonald; Natalie Stingelin; Jenny Nelson

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 617 KB
• Volume: 49
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0887-6266
• DOI: 10.1002/polb.22244

✦ Synopsis

Abstract

The effect of the addition of 1,8‐octanedithiol (ODT) during processing on the microstructure of blend films of poly[2,6‐(4,4‐bis‐(2‐ethylhexyl)‐4H‐cyclopenta[2,1‐b;3,4‐b′]dithiophene)‐alt‐4,7(2,1,3‐benzothiadiazole)] (PCPDTBT) and [6,6]‐phenyl‐C~71~ butyric acid methyl ester ([70]PCBM) is studied. Grazing incidence X‐ray diffraction and absorption spectroscopy show that the crystalline order of PCPDTBT increases when ODT is introduced in the solution phase either to neat polymer systems or to blends with [70]PCBM. The increased crystalline order is accompanied by less dispersive hole transport in the polymer, and leads to a more efficient formation of a percolating fullerene network within the blend. This contributes to an increase in photocurrent generation. However, the bimolecular recombination rate as determined from photovoltage transients increases upon addition of ODT, limiting the power conversion efficiency to values well below those expected from the energy levels of PCPDTBT. We propose some explanations for this increase in bimolecular recombination, based also on variable angle spectroscopic ellipsometry measurements. © 2011 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Polym Sci Part B: Polym Phys, 2011