The effect of morphology upon mobility: Implications for bulk heterojunction solar cells with nonuniform blend morphology

Abstract

We use a Monte Carlo model to predict the effect of composition, domain size, and energetic disorder upon the mobility of carriers in an organic donor-acceptor blend. These simulations show that, for the changes in local morphology expected within the thickness of a typical bulk heterojunction photovoltaic device, changes in mobility of more than an order of magnitude are expected. The impact of nonuniform mobility upon space-charge-limited diode and photovoltaic (PV) device performance is examined using a drift-diffusion model. The current passing through a space-charge-limited diode is shown to depend upon the position of the layers with differing mobility. Accurate modeling of the current in such devices can only be achieved using a drift-diffusion model incorporating nonuniform mobility. Inserting a 20 nm thick layer in which the mobility is less by one order of magnitude than in the rest of the 70 nm thick PV device reduced the device efficiency by more than 20%. Therefore it seems vital to exert a high degree of control over the morphology throughout the entire blend PV device, otherwise potential PV performance may be lost.