Issue 19, 2017, Issue in Progress

Elucidation of hierarchical metallophthalocyanine buffer layers in bulk heterojunction solar cells

Abstract

Vapour deposited metallophthalocyanines (VoPC, NiPC, SnPC, TiPC, FePC, InPC) were inserted as thin p-type buffer layers into organic solar cells consisting of regio-regular poly(3-hexylthiophene) and [6,6]-phenyl C61-butyric acid methyl ester in order to modify the band alignment for enhanced photovoltaic responses. It is observed that the VoPC, NiPC and SnPC show higher efficiencies in both ∼5 nm and ∼10 nm thicknesses of film when coated on a PEDOT:PSS layer. The observations were an enhanced efficiency with a maximum JSC value of 14.80 mA cm−2, VOC of 0.60, and FF of 51% with a conversion efficiency of 3.61% in the case of ∼5 nm thick VoPC, while the ∼5 nm thick NiPC shows a JSC value of 11.15 mA cm−2 with 3.13% efficiency, and similarly the ∼10 nm thick NiPC has a JSC value of 8.98 mA cm−2 with overall efficiency of 2.52%. However, the TiPC, FePC and InPC show poor efficiencies even lower than those of the usual bulk-heterojunction solar cells with deposition of either a ∼5 nm or a 10 nm buffer layer. The enhanced efficiency in VoPC, NiPC and SnPC may be the result of extended absorption, high transparency, planar porphyrin complex orientation and holding p-type properties to transfer the hole efficiently towards the anodes, with additionally a better bicontinuous interpenetrating network with vapour deposited layers, which greatly reduces the exciton loss and improves the charge transport capability.

Graphical abstract: Elucidation of hierarchical metallophthalocyanine buffer layers in bulk heterojunction solar cells

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
17 Nov 2016
Accepted
02 Feb 2017
First published
14 Feb 2017
This article is Open Access
Creative Commons BY license

RSC Adv., 2017,7, 11304-11311

Elucidation of hierarchical metallophthalocyanine buffer layers in bulk heterojunction solar cells

M. A. Khan and U. Farva, RSC Adv., 2017, 7, 11304 DOI: 10.1039/C6RA26919B

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