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A-π-A structured non-fullerene acceptors for stable organic solar cells with efficiency over 17%

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An Erratum to this article was published on 20 September 2022

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Abstract

With the development of photovoltaic materials, especially the small molecule acceptors (SMAs), organic solar cells (OSCs) have made breakthroughs in power conversion efficiencies (PCEs). However, the stability of high-performance OSCs remains a critical challenge for future technological applications. To tackle the inherent instability of SMA materials under the ambient conditions, much effort has been made to improve OSCs stability, including device modification and new materials design. Here we proposed a new electron acceptor design strategy and developed a “quasi-macromolecule” (QM) with an A-π-A structure, where the functionalized π-bridge is used as a linker between two SMAs (A), to improve the long-term stability without deteriorating device efficiencies. Such type of QMs enables excellent synthetic flexibility to modulate their optical/electrochemical properties, crystallization and aggregation behaviors by changing the A and π units. Moreover, QMs possess a unique long conjugated backbone combining high molecular weight over 3.5 kDa with high purity. Compared with the corresponding SMA BTP-4F-OD (Y6-OD), the devices based on newly synthesized A-π-A type acceptors QM1 and QM2 could exhibit better device stability and more promising PCEs of 17.05% and 16.36%, respectively. This kind of “molecular-framework” (A-π-A) structure provides a new design strategy for developing high-efficiency and -stability photovoltaic materials.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (52125306, 21875286, 22005347), the Natural Science Foundation of Hunan Province (2021JJ20068), and the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2017YFA0206600).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of Powder Metallurgy, College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Central South University, Changsha, 410083, China

    Wei Liu, Jun Yuan, Qingya Wei, Songting Liang, Yunbin Hu & Yingping Zou

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

    Can Zhu, Lei Meng & Yongfang Li

  3. Biomolecular and Organic Electronics, IFM, Linköping University, 58183, Linköping, Sweden

    Huotian Zhang & Feng Gao

  4. Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility (SSRF), Zhangjiang Lab, Shanghai Advanced Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shanghai, 201204, China

    Guanhaojie Zheng

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  1. Wei Liu
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  2. Jun Yuan
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  3. Can Zhu
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Correspondence to Jun Yuan or Yingping Zou.

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The supporting information is available online at http://chem.scichina.com and http://link.springer.com/journal/11426. The supporting materials are published as submitted, without typesetting or editing. The responsibility for scientific accuracy and content remains entirely with the authors.

The online version of the original article can be found at https://doi.org/10.1007/s11426-022-1393-1

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A-π-A structured non-fullerene acceptors for stable organic solar cells with efficiency over 17%, approximately 2.83 MB.

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Liu, W., Yuan, J., Zhu, C. et al. A-π-A structured non-fullerene acceptors for stable organic solar cells with efficiency over 17%. Sci. China Chem. 65, 1374–1382 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11426-022-1281-0

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