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Stable Radical TEMPO Terminated Perylene Bisimide(PBI) Based Small Molecule as Cathode Interlayer for Efficient Organic Solar Cells

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Abstract

By combining stable radical tetramethylpiperidine nitrogen oxide(TEMPO) as end groups and perylene bisimide(PBI) as the core, a small molecular cathode interlayer(CIL) (PBI-TEMPO) was synthesized. Detailed physical-chemical characterizations indicate that PBI-TEMPO can form smooth film, owns low unoccupied molecular orbital(LUMO) level of −3.67 eV and can reduce the work function of silver electrode. When using PBI-TEMPO as CIL in non-fullerene organic solar cells(OSCs), the PM6:BTP-4Cl based OSCs delivered high power conversion efficiencies(PCEs) up to 17.37%, higher than those using commercial PDINO CIL with PCEs of 16.95%. Further device characterizations indicate that PBI-TEMPO can facilitate more efficient exciton dissociation and reduce charge recombination, resulting in enhanced current density and fill factor. Moreover, PBI-TEMPO displays higher thermal stability than PDINO in solution. When PBI-TEMPO and PDINO solution were heated at 150 °C for 2 h and then were used as CIL in solar cells, PBI-TEMPO-based OSCs provided a PCE of 15%, while PDINO-based OSCs only showed a PCE of 10%. These results demonstrate that incorporating TEMPO into conjugated materials is a useful strategy to create new organic semiconductors for application in OSCs.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Nos.92163128, 52073016, 52163018), the Open Project of State Key Laboratory of Organic-Inorganic Composites, China(No.oic-202201006) and the Fund of the Academy of Sciences of Jiangxi Province, China(Nos.2022YJC2017, 2021YSBG22034, 2021YSBG22033).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Chemistry and Environmental Science, Hebei University, Baoding, 071002, P. R. China

    Ziwei Zhang & Yonggang Wu

  2. Institute of Applied Chemistry, Jiangxi Academy of Sciences, Nanchang, 330096, P. R. China

    Dongdong Xia, Qian Xie, Chaowei Zhao & Jie Fang

  3. Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Soft Matter Science and Engineering and State Key Laboratory of Organic-Inorganic Composites, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing, 100029, P. R. China

    Weiwei Li

Authors
  1. Ziwei Zhang
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  2. Dongdong Xia
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  3. Qian Xie
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  4. Chaowei Zhao
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  5. Jie Fang
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  6. Yonggang Wu
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  7. Weiwei Li
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Correspondence to Jie Fang, Yonggang Wu or Weiwei Li.

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Zhang, Z., Xia, D., Xie, Q. et al. Stable Radical TEMPO Terminated Perylene Bisimide(PBI) Based Small Molecule as Cathode Interlayer for Efficient Organic Solar Cells. Chem. Res. Chin. Univ. 39, 213–218 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40242-023-2346-4

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40242-023-2346-4

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