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Single-wall carbon nanotube-containing cathode interfacial materials for high performance organic solar cells

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Abstract

Water/alcohol soluble cathode interfacial materials (CIMs) are playing important roles in optoelectronic devices such as organic light emitting diodes, perovskite solar cells and organic solar cells (OSCs). Herein, n-doped solution-processable single-wall carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs)-containing CIMs for OSCs are developed by dispersing SWCNTs to the typical CIMs perylene diimide (PDI) derivatives PDIN and PDINO. The Raman and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) measurement results illustrate the n-doped behavior of SWCNTs by PDIN/PDINO in the blend CIMs. The blended and n-doped SWCNTs can tune the work function and enhance the conductivity of the PDI-derivative/SWCNT (PDI-CNT) composite CIMs, and the composite CIMs can regulate and down-shift the work function of cathode, reduce the charge recombination, improve the charge extraction rate and enhance photovoltaic performance of the OSCs. High power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 17.1% and 17.7% are obtained for the OSCs based on PM6:Y6 and ternary PM6:Y6:PC71BM respectively with the PDI-CNT composites CIMs. These results indicate that the n-doped SWCNT-containing composites, like other n-doped nanomaterials such as zero dimensional fullerenes and two dimensional graphenes, are excellent CIMs for OSCs and could find potential applications in other optoelectronic devices.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (91633301, 51863002, 51973042), the Excellent Young Scientific and Technological Talents of Guizhou, China (QKHPTRC[2019]5652) and the Cultivation and Innovation of New Academic Talents of Guizhou Institute of Technology (GZLGXM-05).

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  1. These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Chemical Engineering, Guizhou Institute of Technology, Guiyang, 550003, China

    Fei Pan, Song Bai, Tianhao Liu, Xian Wei & Menglan Lv

  2. Beijing National Laboratory for Molecular Sciences, CAS Key Laboratory of Organic Solids, Institute of Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100190, China

    Fei Pan, Menglan Lv & Yongfang Li

  3. Chongqing Engineering Laboratory of Targeted and Innovative Therapeutics, International Academy of Targeted Therapeutics and Innovation, Chongqing University of Arts and Sciences, Chongqing, 402160, China

    Dianyong Tang

  4. Guangzhou Polyforte Chemical Technology Co. LTD, Guangzhou, 510520, China

    Xiwen Chen

  5. School of Chemical Science, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, 100049, China

    Fei Pan & Yongfang Li

  6. School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Guizhou University, Guiyang, 550025, China

    Tianhao Liu & Menglan Lv

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  1. Fei Pan
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  2. Song Bai
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Correspondence to Menglan Lv or Yongfang Li.

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Pan, F., Bai, S., Liu, T. et al. Single-wall carbon nanotube-containing cathode interfacial materials for high performance organic solar cells. Sci. China Chem. 64, 565–575 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11426-020-9917-6

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