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Ultra-Thin Organic Solar Cells Incorporating Dielectric-Coated Comb Silver Nanogratings

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Abstract

Although coating engineering on metallic nanostructures has been frequently applied in organic solar cells (OSCs) for improving the device performance by preventing the possible exciton quenching and charge recombination at the metal surface, there have been few theoretical researches addressing how the dielectric-coating of metal nanostructures influences the optical performance of OSCs. Here, we theoretically investigate the effect of coating a comb silver nanograting by a dielectric film on the absorption performance of OSCs. It is found that, under transverse-magnetic (TM) polarization, when the refractive index or thickness of the dielectric-coating is tuned, different orders of plasmonic waveguide modes are excited by the P3HT:PC61BM/coating/Ag triple-layered system. The dispersion relationship of such a plamsonic waveguide mode is solved and analyzed for clarifying the physical mechanism of the induced light trapping effect. It shows that for optimizing the light absorption in active layer under TM polarization, it is more favorable to coat a thin dielectric film (of 1 nm thick) with a suitable refractive index. While under transverse-electric (TE) polarization, the higher refractive index of dielectric-coating, the better the effect of light trapping.

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Acknowledgments

This research work was financially supported by the National Natural Scientific Foundation of China (61274056, 11204205, 61475109, 11204202, 61308093), Key Laboratory Foundation of Advanced Display and System Applications of Ministry of Education in Shanghai University, International Science & Technology Cooperation Program of China (2012DFR50460), Outstanding Young Scholars of Shanxi Province, the New Teachers’ Fund for Doctor Stations (20121402120017, 20131402120020), Hong Kong Scholar Plan (XJ2013002), Doctoral Program of Higher Education Research Fund (20121402120017), and the Top Young Academic Leaders of Higher Learning Institutions of Shanxi.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Lab of Advanced Transducers and Intelligent Control System of Ministry of Education, College of Physics and Optoelectronics, Taiyuan University of Technology, Taiyuan, 030024, China

    Wenyan Wang, Yuying Hao, Yanxia Cui, Ye Zhang & Fang Shi

  2. Key Laboratory of Advanced Display and System Applications, Ministry of Education, Shanghai University, Yanchang Road 149, Shanghai, 200072, China

    Bin Wei

  3. Key Laboratory for Organic Electronics & Information Displays (KLOEID) and Institute of Advanced Materials, Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications (NUPT), Nanjing, 210046, China

    Wei Huang

Authors
  1. Wenyan Wang
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  2. Yuying Hao
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  3. Yanxia Cui
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  4. Ye Zhang
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  5. Fang Shi
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  6. Bin Wei
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  7. Wei Huang
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Correspondence to Yuying Hao or Yanxia Cui.

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Wang, W., Hao, Y., Cui, Y. et al. Ultra-Thin Organic Solar Cells Incorporating Dielectric-Coated Comb Silver Nanogratings. Plasmonics 11, 151–157 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-015-0020-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11468-015-0020-5

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