Abstract
Solvent vapor annealing (SVA) studies on the morphology and performance of a porphyrin-based deep-absorption organic solar cells consisting of a strongly segregated bulk heterojunction (BHJ) blend, are presented. It is seen that the solvent vapor annealing of a well-mixed BHJ blends induces molecular motion, leading to a phase separated morphology governed by a spinodal decomposition mechanism. The earlier stage of solvent vapor swelling (<10 s) led to an obvious phase separation but not device performance. The device performance showed a dramatic increase in short circuit current and fill factor between 15 and 20 s of SVA. Thus, phase purity is a critical parameter in determining the performance of this binary blend. SVA on a thermally annealed BHJ thin film showed two distinctive processes, a crystal dissolution and a recrystallization, accompanied by phase mixing and then phase separation. The final morphology of SVA films that were initially thermally annealed showed a reduced length scale of phase separation, in comparison to SVA on as-cast films. Thus preformed donor crystallites appear to lock-in the morphology, even in a small molecule blend setting. The best performing device was obtained by a slight SVA (10 s) of films that were initially thermally annealed, reaching a power conversion efficiency of 8.48%. This suggests that the localized morphological optimization and domain size reduction are most important factors in dictating organic photovoltaic device efficiencies.
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