IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/nat/natene/v7y2022i11d10.1038_s41560-022-01138-y.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Suppressed recombination loss in organic photovoltaics adopting a planar–mixed heterojunction architecture

Author

Listed:
  • Kui Jiang

    (City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong)

  • Jie Zhang

    (Chinese Academy of Sciences)

  • Cheng Zhong

    (Wuhan University)

  • Francis R. Lin

    (City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong)

  • Feng Qi

    (City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong)

  • Qian Li

    (Nanjing University)

  • Zhengxing Peng

    (North Carolina State University)

  • Werner Kaminsky

    (University of Washington)

  • Sei-Hum Jang

    (University of Washington)

  • Jianwei Yu

    (Linköping University)

  • Xiang Deng

    (City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong)

  • Huawei Hu

    (Donghua University)

  • Dong Shen

    (City University of Hong Kong)

  • Feng Gao

    (Linköping University)

  • Harald Ade

    (North Carolina State University)

  • Min Xiao

    (Nanjing University)

  • Chunfeng Zhang

    (Nanjing University
    Nanjing University)

  • Alex K.-Y. Jen

    (City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong
    City University of Hong Kong
    University of Washington)

Abstract

At present, high-performance organic photovoltaics mostly adopt a bulk-heterojunction architecture, in which exciton dissociation is facilitated by charge-transfer states formed at numerous donor–acceptor (D-A) heterojunctions. However, the spin character of charge-transfer states originated from recombination of photocarriers allows relaxation to the lowest-energy triplet exciton (T1) at these heterojunctions, causing photocurrent loss. Here we find that this loss pathway can be alleviated in sequentially processed planar–mixed heterojunction (PMHJ) devices, employing donor and acceptor with intrinsically weaker exciton binding strengths. The reduced D-A intermixing in PMHJ alleviates non-geminate recombination at D-A contacts, limiting the chance of relaxation, thus suppressing T1 formation without sacrificing exciton dissociation efficiency. This resulted in devices with high power conversion efficiencies of >19%. We elucidate the working mechanisms for PMHJs and discuss the implications for material design, device engineering and photophysics, thus providing a comprehensive grounding for future organic photovoltaics to reach their full promise.

Suggested Citation

  • Kui Jiang & Jie Zhang & Cheng Zhong & Francis R. Lin & Feng Qi & Qian Li & Zhengxing Peng & Werner Kaminsky & Sei-Hum Jang & Jianwei Yu & Xiang Deng & Huawei Hu & Dong Shen & Feng Gao & Harald Ade & M, 2022. "Suppressed recombination loss in organic photovoltaics adopting a planar–mixed heterojunction architecture," Nature Energy, Nature, vol. 7(11), pages 1076-1086, November.
    • Handle: RePEc:nat:natene:v:7:y:2022:i:11:d:10.1038_s41560-022-01138-y
    DOI: 10.1038/s41560-022-01138-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41560-022-01138-y
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1038/s41560-022-01138-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Yuanyuan Jiang & Yixin Li & Feng Liu & Wenxuan Wang & Wenli Su & Wuyue Liu & Songjun Liu & Wenkai Zhang & Jianhui Hou & Shengjie Xu & Yuanping Yi & Xiaozhang Zhu, 2023. "Suppressing electron-phonon coupling in organic photovoltaics for high-efficiency power conversion," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 14(1), pages 1-12, December.
    2. Chieh-Ming Hung & Sheng-Fu Wang & Wei-Chih Chao & Jian-Liang Li & Bo-Han Chen & Chih-Hsuan Lu & Kai-Yen Tu & Shang-Da Yang & Wen-Yi Hung & Yun Chi & Pi-Tai Chou, 2024. "High-performance near-infrared OLEDs maximized at 925 nm and 1022 nm through interfacial energy transfer," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-10, December.
    3. Chen Chen & Liang Wang & Weiyi Xia & Ke Qiu & Chuanhang Guo & Zirui Gan & Jing Zhou & Yuandong Sun & Dan Liu & Wei Li & Tao Wang, 2024. "Molecular interaction induced dual fibrils towards organic solar cells with certified efficiency over 20%," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-10, December.
    4. Jinfeng Huang & Tianyi Chen & Le Mei & Mengting Wang & Yuxuan Zhu & Jiting Cui & Yanni Ouyang & Youwen Pan & Zhaozhao Bi & Wei Ma & Zaifei Ma & Haiming Zhu & Chunfeng Zhang & Xian-Kai Chen & Hongzheng, 2024. "On the role of asymmetric molecular geometry in high-performance organic solar cells," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-11, December.
    5. Xinjun He & Feng Qi & Xinhui Zou & Yanxun Li & Heng Liu & Xinhui Lu & Kam Sing Wong & Alex K.-Y. Jen & Wallace C. H. Choy, 2024. "Selenium substitution for dielectric constant improvement and hole-transfer acceleration in non-fullerene organic solar cells," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-9, December.
    6. Congqi Li & Guo Yao & Xiaobin Gu & Jikai Lv & Yuqi Hou & Qijie Lin & Na Yu & Misbah Sehar Abbasi & Xin Zhang & Jianqi Zhang & Zheng Tang & Qian Peng & Chunfeng Zhang & Yunhao Cai & Hui Huang, 2024. "Highly efficient organic solar cells enabled by suppressing triplet exciton formation and non-radiative recombination," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 15(1), pages 1-9, December.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:nat:natene:v:7:y:2022:i:11:d:10.1038_s41560-022-01138-y. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nature.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.