Abstract
Improving power conversion efficiency and device performance stability is the most critical challenge in polymer solar cells for fulfilling their applications in industry at large scale. Various methodologies have been developed for realizing this goal, among them interfacial layer engineering has shown great success, which can optimize the electrical contacts between active layers and electrodes and lead to enhanced charge transport and collection. Interfacial layers also show profound impacts on light absorption and optical distribution of solar irradiation in the active layer and film morphology of the subsequently deposited active layer due to the accompanied surface energy change. Interfacial layer engineering enables the use of high work function metal electrodes without sacrificing device performance, which in combination with the favored kinetic barriers against water and oxygen penetration leads to polymer solar cells with enhanced performance stability. This review provides an overview of the recent progress of different types of interfacial layer materials, including polymers, small molecules, graphene oxides, fullerene derivatives, and metal oxides. Device performance enhancement of the resulting solar cells will be elucidated and the function and operation mechanism of the interfacial layers will be discussed.
Highlights
As a new clean and sustainable energy source, organic solar cells (OSCs) have received a great amount of attention from both academia and industry in the past three decades [1,2,3]
The invention of bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells greatly improves the power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of polymer solar cells (PSCs), which is mainly attributed to the more efficient exciton dissociations enabled by the maximized heterojunction interface and increased charge carrier collection attributed to the formation of interpenetrating network
We have reviewed five types of interfacial layer materials for applications in high-performance polymer solar cells, and the device performance of resulting cells has been discussed with respect to the function and operation mechanisms of these interfacial layers
Summary
As a new clean and sustainable energy source, organic solar cells (OSCs) have received a great amount of attention from both academia and industry in the past three decades [1,2,3]. PSCs typically exhibit improved performance in comparison to small molecule-based solar cells [9,10,13], which could be mainly attributed to the better absorption of solar irradiation enabled by the smaller band gaps of polymer semiconductors [3,12,20,21] versus small molecules, and more efficient exciton dissociation and charge transport and collection in the interpenetrating polymer/fullerene network versus small molecule/fullerene blend [22,23,24]. The invention of BHJ solar cells greatly improves the PCEs of PSCs, which is mainly attributed to the more efficient exciton dissociations enabled by the maximized heterojunction interface and increased charge carrier collection attributed to the formation of interpenetrating network. This work is mainly organized based on the materials types of the IFLs, including polymers, organic small molecules, fullerene derivatives, metal oxides, and emerging novel IFLs, such as graphene oxide and its derivatives
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