Polymer selection toward efficient polymer/PbSe planar heterojunction hybrid solar cells

Organic p‐type materials are potential candidates as solution processable hole transport materials (HTMs) for colloidal quantum dot solar cells (CQDSCs) because of their good hole accepting/electron blocking characteristics and synthetic versatility. However, organic HTMs have still demonstrated inferior performance compared to conventional p‐type CQD HTMs. In this work, organic π‐conjugated polymer (π‐CP) based HTMs, which can achieve performance superior to that of state‐of‐the‐art HTM, p‐type CQDs, are developed. The molecular engineering of the π‐CPs alters their optoelectronic properties, and the charge generation and collection in CQDSCs using them are substantially improved. A device using PBDTTPD‐HT achieves power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 11.53% with decent air‐storage stability. This is the highest reported PCE among CQDSCs using organic HTMs, and even higher than the reported best solid‐state ligand exchange‐free CQDSC using pCQD‐HTM. From the viewpoint of device processing, device fabrication does not require any solid‐state ligand exchange step or layer‐by‐layer deposition process, which is favorable for exploiting commercial processing techniques.

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Molecular Engineering in Hole Transport π‐Conjugated Polymers to Enable High Efficiency Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells

Mubarok

Aqoma

Wibowo

et al. 2020

“…They have low‐temperature solution‐processability, which is compatible with high‐throughput processes, and their energy levels and electric properties are easily controllable by manipulation of the chemical structure . There have been several attempts to employ p‐type organic semiconductors as HTLs for CQDPVs . Thus far, poly(3‐hexylthiophene) (P3HT) has demonstrated the best performance as an organic HTL for CQDPVs, achieving a PCE of 5.1–7.5% .…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Improved Processability and Efficiency of Colloidal Quantum Dot Solar Cells Based on Organic Hole Transport Layers

Aqoma

Mubarok

Lee

et al. 2018

IntroductionColloidal quantum dot (CQD) based photovoltaic devices (CQDPVs) have emerged as promising next-generation solar cells owing to low-cost solution processibility at low temperature, easy bandgap tunability into the near infrared (NIR, λ > 800 nm) regime, and multiple exciton generation. [1,2] The power conversion efficiency (PCE) of CQDPVs has improved High-efficiency solid-state-ligand-exchange (SSE) step-free colloidal quantum dot photovoltaic (CQDPV) devices are developed by employing CQD ink based active layers and organic (Polythieno[3,4-b]-thiophene-co-benzodithiophene (PTB7) and poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT)) based hole transport layers (HTLs). The device using PTB7 as an HTL exhibits superior performance to that using the current leading organic HTL, P3HT, because of favorable energy levels, higher hole mobility, and facilitated interfacial charge transfer. The PTB7 based device achieves power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 9.60%, which is the highest among reported CQDPVs using organic HTLs. This result is also comparable to the PCE of an optimized device based on a thiol-exchanged p-type CQD, the current-state-of-the-art HTL. From the viewpoint of device processing, the fabrication of CQDPVs is achieved by direct single-coating of CQD active layers and organic HTLs at low temperature without SSE steps. The experimental results and device simulation results in this work suggest that further engineering of organic HTL materials can open new doors to improve the performance and processing of CQDPVs.

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mentioning

confidence: 99%

Mediating Colloidal Quantum Dot/Organic Semiconductor Interfaces for Efficient Hybrid Solar Cells

Kim

Baek

Kim

et al. 2021

of two different materials. [7,[16][17][18][19] It also enables the hybrids to inherit the superior mechanical flexibility of organic materials. [20,21] Since the first CQD/ organic hybrid solar cells were proposed, [22] efforts have been underway to improve the PCE. Although many previous studies successfully demonstrated complementary absorption, the PCEs of hybrid solar cells are still affected by inefficient charge extraction, caused by 1) the short exciton diffusion length in polymers, [19] 2) poor nanomorphology of the CQD:polymer mix causing unfavorable charge transfer pathways, and 3) local trap sites at the interfaces of CQD and polymer. [18] Various strategies such as exploration of new materials for use in the hybrids, [23][24][25][26][27] tuning CQD size, [18,28] molecular modification, [18,29] and ligand exchange [30,31] have been proposed to enhance the charge extraction in CQD/polymer hybrids. Among them, tuning the CQD surface using organic/inorganic ligands has been widely investigated because it can modify the CQD surface that affects the electrical properties. [16,32,33] Recently, a small-molecule bridge was employed in CQD/ organic hybrid solar cells to overcome the short exciton diffusion length problem; [34,35] however, the hybrid cells still suffer from substantial trap sites at the CQD/organic interfaces, limiting charge extraction. The CQD/organic interfaces have many trap sites due to the large difference in surface energy between the CQD and polymer, [18] the presence of insulating ligands, [16] and defects on the CQD surfaces. [36] These CQD/polymer interfaces potentially hinder charge transport and induce bimolecular recombination.In this work, we systematically investigated how the CQD/ organic interfaces influenced the charge transport properties. First, we replaced the native ligand of CQD with halides to form conventional CQD solids. [37] Subsequently, a polymer layer was stacked onto the CQD solid to form a CQD/organic heterointerface. Additionally, an auxiliary interfacial layer passivated by various organic ligands was implemented at the CQD/polymer interface. The interfacial layer that provides the cascading conduction band offset (ΔE C ) between CQD and polymer relieved band bending that adversely hinders the charge transfer at CQD/polymer interfaces. The reduced band bending facilitated the charge transfer across the heterojunction by suppressing charge accumulation -as confirmed by transient photocurrent (TPC) spectroscopy -and by reducing bimolecular recombination at the CQD/polymer interfaces.Emerging semiconducting materials including colloidal quantum dots (CQDs) and organic molecules have unique photovoltaic properties, and their hybridization can result in synergistic effects for high performance. For realizing the full potential of CQD/organic hybrid devices, controlling interfacial properties between the CQD and organic matter is crucial. Here, the electronic band between the CQD and the polymer layers is carefully modulated by inserting an interfacial layer treated...