No abstract

Perovskite light-emitting diodes (PeLEDs) have shown excellent performance in the green and near-infrared spectral regions, with high color purity, efficiency, and brightness. In order to shift the emission wavelength to the blue, compositional engineering (anion mixing) and quantum-confinement engineering (reduced-dimensionality) have been employed. Unfortunately, LED emission profiles shift with increasing driving voltages due to either phase separation or the coexistence of multiple crystal domains. Here we report color-stable sky-blue PeLEDs achieved by enhancing the phase monodispersity of quasi-2D perovskite thin films. We selected cation combinations that modulate the crystallization and layer thickness distribution of the domains. The perovskite films show a record photoluminescence quantum yield of 88% at 477 nm. The corresponding PeLEDs exhibit stable sky-blue emission under high operation voltages. A maximum luminance of 2480 cd m−2 at 490 nm is achieved, fully one order of magnitude higher than the previous record for quasi-2D blue PeLEDs.

Simutaneously high open circuit voltage and high short circuit current density is a big challenge for achieving high efficiency polymer solar cells due to the excitonic nature of organic semdonductors. Herein, we developed a trialkylsilyl substituted 2D-conjugated polymer with the highest occupied molecular orbital level down-shifted by Si–C bond interaction. The polymer solar cells obtained by pairing this polymer with a non-fullerene acceptor demonstrated a high power conversion efficiency of 11.41% with both high open circuit voltage of 0.94 V and high short circuit current density of 17.32 mA cm−2 benefitted from the complementary absorption of the donor and acceptor, and the high hole transfer efficiency from acceptor to donor although the highest occupied molecular orbital level difference between the donor and acceptor is only 0.11 eV. The results indicate that the alkylsilyl substitution is an effective way in designing high performance conjugated polymer photovoltaic materials.

High-efficiency all-polymer solar cells with less thickness-dependent behavior are demonstrated by using a low bandgap n-type conjugated polymer N2200 as acceptor and an absorption-complementary difluorobenzotriazole-based medium-bandgap polymer J51 as donor.

Low bandgap n-type organic semiconductor (n-OS) ITIC has attracted great attention for the application as an acceptor with medium bandgap p-type conjugated polymer as donor in nonfullerene polymer solar cells (PSCs) because of its attractive photovoltaic performance. Here we report a modification on the molecular structure of ITIC by side-chain isomerization with meta-alkyl-phenyl substitution, m-ITIC, to further improve its photovoltaic performance. In a comparison with its isomeric counterpart ITIC with para-alkyl-phenyl substitution, m-ITIC shows a higher film absorption coefficient, a larger crystalline coherence, and higher electron mobility. These inherent advantages of m-ITIC resulted in a higher power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 11.77% for the nonfullerene PSCs with m-ITIC as acceptor and a medium bandgap polymer J61 as donor, which is significantly improved over that (10.57%) of the corresponding devices with ITIC as acceptor. To the best of our knowledge, the PCE of 11.77% is one of the highest values reported in the literature to date for nonfullerene PSCs. More importantly, the m-ITIC-based device shows less thickness-dependent photovoltaic behavior than ITIC-based devices in the active-layer thickness range of 80-360 nm, which is beneficial for large area device fabrication. These results indicate that m-ITIC is a promising low bandgap n-OS for the application as an acceptor in PSCs, and the side-chain isomerization could be an easy and convenient way to further improve the photovoltaic performance of the donor and acceptor materials for high efficiency PSCs.

Non-fullerene polymer solar cells (PSCs) with solution-processable n-type organic semiconductor (n-OS) as acceptor have seen rapid progress recently owing to the synthesis of new low bandgap n-OS, such as ITIC. To further increase power conversion efficiency (PCE) of the devices, it is of a great challenge to develop suitable polymer donor material that matches well with the low bandgap n-OS acceptors thus providing complementary absorption and nanoscaled blend morphology, as well as suppressed recombination and minimized energy loss. To address this challenge, we synthesized three medium bandgap 2D-conjugated bithienyl-benzodithiophene-alt-fluorobenzotriazole copolymers J52, J60, and J61 for the application as donor in the PSCs with low bandgap n-OS ITIC as acceptor. The three polymers were designed with branched alkyl (J52), branched alkylthio (J60), and linear alkylthio (J61) substituent on the thiophene conjugated side chain of the benzodithiophene (BDT) units for studying effect of the substituents on the photovoltaic performance of the polymers. The alkylthio side chain, red-shifted absorption down-shifted the highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) level and improved crystallinity of the 2D conjugated polymers. With linear alkylthio side chain, the tailored polymer J61 exhibits an enhanced JSC of 17.43 mA/cm(2), a high VOC of 0.89 V, and a PCE of 9.53% in the best non-fullerene PSCs with the polymer as donor and ITIC as acceptor. To the best of our knowledge, the PCE of 9.53% is one of the highest values reported in literature to date for the non-fullerene PSCs. The results indicate that J61 is a promising medium bandgap polymer donor in non-fullerene PSCs.

Antimony selenide is an emerging promising thin film photovoltaic material thanks to its binary composition, suitable bandgap, high absorption coefficient, inert grain boundaries and earth-abundant constituents. However, current devices produced from rapid thermal evaporation strategy suffer from low-quality film and unsatisfactory performance. Herein, we develop a vapor transport deposition technique to fabricate antimony selenide films, a technique that enables continuous and low-cost manufacturing of cadmium telluride solar cells. We improve the crystallinity of antimony selenide films and then successfully produce superstrate cadmium sulfide/antimony selenide solar cells with a certified power conversion efficiency of 7.6%, a net 2% improvement over previous 5.6% record of the same device configuration. We analyze the deep defects in antimony selenide solar cells, and find that the density of the dominant deep defects is reduced by one order of magnitude using vapor transport deposition process.

Circularly polarized light (CPL) detection is required in various fields such as drug screening, security surveillance and quantum optics. Conventionally, CPL photodetector needs the installation of optical elements, imposing difficulties for integrated and flexible devices. The established CPL detectors without optical elements rely on chiral organic semiconductor and metal metamaterials, but they suffer from extremely low responsivity. Organic-inorganic hybrid materials combine CPL-sensitive absorption induced by chiral organics and efficient charge transport of inorganic frameworks, providing an option for direct CPL detection. Here we report the CPL detector using chiral organic-inorganic hybrid perovskites, and obtain a device with responsivity of 797 mA W -1 , detectivity of 7.1 × 10 11 Jones, 3-dB frequency of 150 Hz and one-month stability, a competitive combined feature for circularly polarized light detection. Thanks to the solution processing, we further demonstrate flexible devices on polyethylene terephthalate substrate with comparable performance.