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Crystals
Special Issues
Towards High-Performance and Stable Organic Solar Cells: Processing and Characterization
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Towards High-Performance and Stable Organic Solar Cells: Processing and Characterization

A special issue of Crystals (ISSN 2073-4352). This special issue belongs to the section "Materials for Energy Applications".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 May 2022) | Viewed by 4591

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Nrup Balar

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Physics and Organic and Carbon Electronics Laboratory (ORaCEL), North Carolina State University, Raleigh, NC 27695, USA
Interests: organic semiconductors; semicrystalline polymers; organic photovoltaics; thin film mechanics; thermodynamics of polymer blends
Dr. Pratik Sen

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
First Solar Inc., Perrysburg, OH 43551, USA
Interests: organic photovolatics; solar energy; photodetection; polymer alignment; polarimetry; printing technologies; module integration

Special Issue Information

Organic solar cells (OSCs) have become a focus of rapid development in recent years owing to the increase in their power conversion efficiencies (from 12% to 18% efficiency in 2 years) through the development of non-fullerene small molecule acceptors (NF-SMAs). Despite the advantages of tunable optical properties and low-cost processing, OSCs still face challenges to their commercialization, in the form of their limited lifetimes under external thermomechanical and photoinduced loads. The performance and lifetime are both affected by the morphology of the active layers, which in turn is affected by various parameters such as the processing conditions, thermomechanical properties of the constituents, and interfaces.

This Special Issue of Crystals aims to receive and publish manuscripts that focus on various processing protocols and characterization techniques to study and improve the lifetimes of organic solar cells. The potential topics include, but are not limited to:

  • The thermomechanical behavior of organic solar cells and organic semiconductor blends;
  • The thermal transitions of organic semiconductors;
  • The morphological characterization of organic semiconductors and blends using various spectroscopic and scattering techniques;
  • The structure–function–property relationships of organic semiconductors, performance, and stability;
  • The engineering of interfaces to develop reliable OSCs.

Dr. Nrup Balar
Dr. Pratik Sen
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Crystals is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • organic solar cells
  • semiconducting polymers
  • structure–function–property relations
  • mechanical properties
  • thermal transitions
  • scattering measurements
  • morphological stability

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

14 pages, 2421 KiB  
Article
Iodine Doping Implementation Effect on the Electrical Response in Metallophthalocyanines (M = Cu, Co, Zn), for Electronic and Photovoltaic Applications
by Leon Hamui, Maria Elena Sánchez-Vergara, Betsabé Calatayud-Valdespino and Roberto Salcedo
Crystals 2022, 12(8), 1037; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst12081037 - 26 Jul 2022
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1622
Abstract
We report the structural organization and its effect on the current response of the conducting domains in MPcs (M = Cu, Co, Zn) films, deposited by vacuum thermal evaporation and doped by the presence of iodine vapors. Structural and surface features of the [...] Read more.
We report the structural organization and its effect on the current response of the conducting domains in MPcs (M = Cu, Co, Zn) films, deposited by vacuum thermal evaporation and doped by the presence of iodine vapors. Structural and surface features of the doped metallophthalocyanines (MPcs) were studied by using IR spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, atomic force microscope (AFM) and scanning electron microscope (SEM). DFT calculations were carried to study the interaction between iodine and MPcs molecules and establish the influence of iodine on the electronic behavior of these species and the changes on the frontier molecular orbitals. This interaction is thermodynamically favored, and the mechanism of electronic transit involving the iodine atoms providing electrons to the transfer. The I-MPc films have a mainly amorphous structure, some crystallinity in the MPcs α and β forms. A roughness between 18.41 and 99.02 nm and particle size between 1.35 and 15 μm. By evaluating the electrical behavior of the flexible PET/ITO/I-MPc/Ag devices, it was found that J-V curves under illuminated conditions show an increase of curves values upon the I-MPc, indicating that the flexible films are photosensible. Jsc between 1.59 × 10−5 and 2.41 × 10−7 A/cm2, conductivities between 6.17 × 10−8–2.54 × 10−7 Scm−1 and photosensibility values of up to 133%. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Towards High-Performance and Stable Organic Solar Cells: Processing and Characterization)
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11 pages, 4041 KiB  
Article
Understanding of Photophysical Processes in DIO Additive-Treated PTB7:PC71BM Solar Cells
by Xiaojun Su, Rong Hu, Guanzhao Wen, Xianshao Zou, Mengyao Qing, Jun Peng, Xiaochuan He and Wei Zhang
Crystals 2021, 11(9), 1139; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/cryst11091139 - 18 Sep 2021
Cited by 4 | Viewed by 2295
Abstract
1,8-diiodooctane (DIO) additive is an important method for optimizing the morphology and device performance of polythieno[3,4-b]-thiophene-co-benzodithiophene (PTB7)-based polymer solar cells. However, the effect of DIO additive on charge photogeneration dynamics of PTB7-based polymer solar cells is still poorly understood. In this work, the [...] Read more.
1,8-diiodooctane (DIO) additive is an important method for optimizing the morphology and device performance of polythieno[3,4-b]-thiophene-co-benzodithiophene (PTB7)-based polymer solar cells. However, the effect of DIO additive on charge photogeneration dynamics of PTB7-based polymer solar cells is still poorly understood. In this work, the effect of DIO additive on the carrier photogeneration dynamics, as well as device performance of PTB7: [6,6]-phenyl-C71-butyric acid methyl ester (PC71BM) solar cells was studied. Bias-dependent photoluminescence (PL) experiments of a neat PTB7 device show that the exciton cannot be dissociated by the electric field in the device within the operating voltage range, but it can be effectively dissociated by the high electric field. PL and time-resolved PL studies show that DIO additive reduces the phase size of PTB7 in the blend film, resulting in an increased exciton dissociation efficiency. The carrier recombination processes were studied by transient absorption, which shows geminate carrier recombination was suppressed in the DIO-treated PTB7:PC71BM device in ultrafast time scale. The increased exciton dissociation efficiency and suppressed carrier recombination in ultrafast time scale play an important role for DIO-treated PTB7:PC71BM solar cells to attain a higher power conversion efficiency. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Towards High-Performance and Stable Organic Solar Cells: Processing and Characterization)
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