High Performing Ternary Solar Cells through Förster Resonance Energy Transfer between Nonfullerene Acceptors

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces. 2017 Aug 16;9(32):26928-26936. doi: 10.1021/acsami.7b08146. Epub 2017 Aug 7.

Abstract

Nonradiative Förster resonance energy transfer (FRET) is an important mechanism of organic solar cells, which can improve the exciton migration over a long distance, resulting in improvement of efficiency of solar cells. However, the current observations of FRET are very limited, and the efficiencies are less than 9%. In this study, FRET effect was first observed between two nonfullerene acceptors in ternary solar cells, which improved both the absorption range and exciton harvesting, leading to the dramatic enhancement in the short circuit current and power conversion efficiency. Moreover, this strategy is proved to be a versatile platform for conjugated polymers with different bandgaps, resulting in a remarkable efficiency of 10.4%. These results demonstrated a novel method to enhance the efficiency of organic soar cells.

Keywords: energy transfer; face-on orientation; nonfullerene acceptors; small amount doping; ternary solar cells.