Enhancing exciton diffusion length provides new opportunities for organic photovoltaics

Muhammad T. Sajjad; Arvydas Ruseckas; Ifor David William Samuel

doi:10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028

Enhancing exciton diffusion length provides new opportunities for organic photovoltaics

Muhammad T. Sajjad, Arvydas Ruseckas, Ifor David William Samuel

Research output: Contribution to journal › Review article › peer-review

Abstract

Organic semiconductors can potentially revolutionize solar cell technology by offering very thin, lightweight, and flexible modules for outdoor and indoor power generation. Light absorption in organic semiconductors generates a bound electron-hole pair (exciton), which needs to travel to the interface between electron donor and acceptor materials to dissociate into charge carriers. Because the exciton diffusion length in organic semiconductors is typically much shorter than the light absorption depth (∼100 nm), planar donor-acceptor heterojunctions are inefficient, and most effort has been dedicated to optimization of bulk heterojunctions with nanoscale phase separation. In this Perspective, we review recent findings and new approaches to increase the exciton diffusion length and discuss how these improvements can benefit environmentally friendly production of solar modules using organic nanoparticles or graded heterojunctions obtained by sequential deposition of electron donor and acceptor.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	341-354
Journal	Matter
Volume	3
Issue number	2
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028
Publication status	Published - 5 Aug 2020

Keywords

Organic solar cell
Organic semiconductor
Energy transfer
Heterojunction
Light-harvesting
Solution-processing

Access to Document

10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028

Sajjad_2020_Matter_AAM
Copyright © 2020 Published by Elsevier Inc. This work has been made available online in accordance with publisher policies or with permission. Permission for further reuse of this content should be sought from the publisher or the rights holder. This is the author created accepted manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at https://doi.org/10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028
Accepted author manuscript, 1.24 MBLicence: CC BY-NC-ND

Hybrid Polaritonics: Hybrid Polaritonics
Samuel, I. D. W. (PI), Höfling, S. (CoI), Keeling, J. M. J. (CoI) & Turnbull, G. (CoI)
EPSRC
1/09/15 → 31/08/20
Project: Standard
Equipment Account: Characterisation and Manipulation of Advanced Functional Materials and their Interfaces at the Nanoscale
Samuel, I. D. W. (PI)
EPSRC
1/10/13 → 30/09/23
Project: Standard
ERC Advanced Grant EXCITON: EU FP7 ERC Advanced Grant 2012 EXCITON
Samuel, I. D. W. (PI)
European Research Council
1/04/13 → 30/03/19
Project: Standard

Cite this

@article{e3e0c7e44bed4d328cd8122fbad1011a,

title = "Enhancing exciton diffusion length provides new opportunities for organic photovoltaics",

abstract = "Organic semiconductors can potentially revolutionize solar cell technology by offering very thin, lightweight, and flexible modules for outdoor and indoor power generation. Light absorption in organic semiconductors generates a bound electron-hole pair (exciton), which needs to travel to the interface between electron donor and acceptor materials to dissociate into charge carriers. Because the exciton diffusion length in organic semiconductors is typically much shorter than the light absorption depth (∼100 nm), planar donor-acceptor heterojunctions are inefficient, and most effort has been dedicated to optimization of bulk heterojunctions with nanoscale phase separation. In this Perspective, we review recent findings and new approaches to increase the exciton diffusion length and discuss how these improvements can benefit environmentally friendly production of solar modules using organic nanoparticles or graded heterojunctions obtained by sequential deposition of electron donor and acceptor.",

keywords = "Organic solar cell, Organic semiconductor, Energy transfer, Heterojunction, Light-harvesting, Solution-processing",

author = "Sajjad, {Muhammad T.} and Arvydas Ruseckas and Samuel, {Ifor David William}",

note = "Authors acknowledge support from the European Research Council (grant 321305) And are also grateful to EPSRC for support from grants (EP/L017008/1) and (EP/M025330/1). ",

year = "2020",

month = aug,

day = "5",

doi = "10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028",

language = "English",

volume = "3",

pages = "341--354",

journal = "Matter",

issn = "2590-2385",

publisher = "Elsevier Inc.",

number = "2",

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TY - JOUR

T1 - Enhancing exciton diffusion length provides new opportunities for organic photovoltaics

AU - Sajjad, Muhammad T.

AU - Ruseckas, Arvydas

AU - Samuel, Ifor David William

N1 - Authors acknowledge support from the European Research Council (grant 321305) And are also grateful to EPSRC for support from grants (EP/L017008/1) and (EP/M025330/1).

PY - 2020/8/5

Y1 - 2020/8/5

N2 - Organic semiconductors can potentially revolutionize solar cell technology by offering very thin, lightweight, and flexible modules for outdoor and indoor power generation. Light absorption in organic semiconductors generates a bound electron-hole pair (exciton), which needs to travel to the interface between electron donor and acceptor materials to dissociate into charge carriers. Because the exciton diffusion length in organic semiconductors is typically much shorter than the light absorption depth (∼100 nm), planar donor-acceptor heterojunctions are inefficient, and most effort has been dedicated to optimization of bulk heterojunctions with nanoscale phase separation. In this Perspective, we review recent findings and new approaches to increase the exciton diffusion length and discuss how these improvements can benefit environmentally friendly production of solar modules using organic nanoparticles or graded heterojunctions obtained by sequential deposition of electron donor and acceptor.

AB - Organic semiconductors can potentially revolutionize solar cell technology by offering very thin, lightweight, and flexible modules for outdoor and indoor power generation. Light absorption in organic semiconductors generates a bound electron-hole pair (exciton), which needs to travel to the interface between electron donor and acceptor materials to dissociate into charge carriers. Because the exciton diffusion length in organic semiconductors is typically much shorter than the light absorption depth (∼100 nm), planar donor-acceptor heterojunctions are inefficient, and most effort has been dedicated to optimization of bulk heterojunctions with nanoscale phase separation. In this Perspective, we review recent findings and new approaches to increase the exciton diffusion length and discuss how these improvements can benefit environmentally friendly production of solar modules using organic nanoparticles or graded heterojunctions obtained by sequential deposition of electron donor and acceptor.

KW - Organic solar cell

KW - Organic semiconductor

KW - Energy transfer

KW - Heterojunction

KW - Light-harvesting

KW - Solution-processing

U2 - 10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028

DO - 10.1016/j.matt.2020.06.028

M3 - Review article

SN - 2590-2385

VL - 3

SP - 341

EP - 354

JO - Matter

JF - Matter

IS - 2

ER -

Enhancing exciton diffusion length provides new opportunities for organic photovoltaics

Abstract

Keywords

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Projects

Hybrid Polaritonics: Hybrid Polaritonics

Equipment Account: Characterisation and Manipulation of Advanced Functional Materials and their Interfaces at the Nanoscale

ERC Advanced Grant EXCITON: EU FP7 ERC Advanced Grant 2012 EXCITON

Cite this