“Jacketing” Effect Liquid Crystalline Polymer with Perylenediimide as Side Chain: Synthesis, Liquid Crystalline Phase, and Photovoltaic Performances

Abstract

All polymer solar cells (all-PSCs) is one of the important emerging renewable energy technologies. In this work, we use "jacketing" effect liquid crystalline polymer (LCP) with perylenediimide as side chain to fabricate all-PSCs. First, poly(2,5-bis{[6-(4-alkoxy-4′-perylenediimide)-6hexyl]oxycarbonyl}styrene) (abbreviated as PPDCS) is successfully synthesized via chain polymerization. The resultant polymer PPDCS forms stable smectic C (SmC) structure until decomposition. The electrochemical experiment indicates PPDCS shows deep LUMO energy level of −3.81 eV, thus, the nonconjugated PPDCS can be employed as acceptor materials to build all-PSCs. Atomic force microscopy (AFM) experiments show that the PBT7/PPDCS blend film forms a bicontinuous network-domains and the resultant film shows extensive absorption spectrum (300−800 nm) on UV−vis spectra. All-PSCs device fabricated by PTB7/PPDCS presents the best power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 1.23% after optimization, where the short-circuit current density (J sc ) is 4.34 mA cm −2 , an open-circuit voltage (V oc ) is 0.65 V, and a fill factor (FF) is 0.37. This work suggests that the nonconjugated LCP shows potential application for solar cell.

Recent Advances of Polymer‐Based Pure Organic Room Temperature Phosphorescent Materials

“…The resultant system offered a new strategy to construct applicable RTP materials in the liquid crystalline state, in which the polymer structure and the side‐chain jacketing effect provided enough restriction for suppressing the phosphors’ movement to a great extent, thus emitting green phosphorescence after cyan fluorescence (Figure 8d). [ 67,68 ]…”

Nucleophilic Aromatic Substitution of Pentafluorophenyl-Substituted Quinoline with a Functional Perylene: A Route to the Modification of Semiconducting Polymers

“…Hence, alternative approaches were reported for organic semiconductors minimizing the toxic byproducts [ 25 , 26 ]. Regarding the PDI-based polymers, little progress has been made for polymers using PDI as side chain, with limited examples in the field [ 5 , 27 , 28 , 29 ]. These examples mainly involve styrenic [ 30 ] or acrylic [ 31 , 32 ] backbones, where PDI derivatives are usually grafted as side chains.…”

A “Rigid–Flexible” Approach for Processable Perylene Diimide-Based Polymers: Influence of the Specific Architecture on the Morphological, Dielectric, Optical, and Electronic Properties

“…When the dimer was employed as an additive in donor:acceptor blends for OPVs, the thermal stability of the device was enhanced . For PDI-based materials, the effect of different alkyl chains on the PDI molecule was investigated in terms of self-assembly , and optoelectronic properties. − Non-conjugated PDI-based polymers were also investigated and used in all polymer solar cells as non-fullerene acceptors …”

“…34−36 Non-conjugated PDI-based polymers were also investigated and used in all polymer solar cells as non-fullerene acceptors. 37 Rigid−flexible polymers containing conjugated segments as their rigid parts have been extensively studied offering processable polymeric materials with controllable photonic properties. The presence of even a few conjugated segments provides the desirable optical and electronic characteristics to the final alternating rigid−flexible or rod−coil semiconducting polymer.…”