Structure-Property Correlation of Electron Transport Materials in Organic Devices
This dissertation deals with organic semiconductors as electron acceptor (n-type) materials in bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. Important features of an electron acceptor are strong visible light absorption, sufficient high electron mobility and appropriate energy levels with respect to the donor. Furthermore, the blend morphology of donor and acceptor is crucial for the device performance. Within this thesis, the synthesis and characterization of novel n-type polymers is reported and various techniques to evaluate the above mentioned parameters for n-type small molecules and polymers are presented. The aim was to investigate the impact of chemical structure on the optical and electronic properties and morphology of these semiconductors. Successful strategies how to control and improve light harvesting, electron mobility, blend morphology and solar cell performance were identified. The fundamental question of charge transport properties of the materials was addressed by fabricating single carrier devices using the SCLC (space-charge limited currents) method. The morphology was primarily investigated by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The first part of this thesis focuses on perylene imide based small molecules and polymers. The side groups of a series of N-substituted perylene bisimides (PBI) were found to play a crucial role on crystallinity and charge transport. The nature of the side groups had great impact on the crystalline structure and electron mobility. When hydrophilic oligoethylenglycol (OEG) side groups were present, the perylene molecules aligned in highly ordered hexagonal or lamellar columns and realized high electron mobilities of up to 7∙10E-3 cm2V-1s-1, while the perylene derivative with only hydrophobic alkyl chains only showed 3∙10E-5 cm2V-1s-1. The substituents at the perylene core also had a major impact on the blend morphology of OPV devices when these materials were used in combination with a donor polymer. Here, we were able to tune the extent of phase separation between donor and acceptor via hydrophilic-hydrophobic interactions of donor polymer and acceptor side groups. To improve light harvesting of perylene compounds, the pi-electron system of PBIs was altered and highly soluble, novel perylene side chain polymers (PPDB and PPDI) were synthesized by nitroxide mediated radical polymerization (NMRP). The pendant perylene moieties were perylene diester benzimidazole (PDB) and perylene diester imide (PDI). Compared to polymers bearing PBI side groups, the visible light absorption of PPDB was broadened and red shifted, whereas a narrower and blue shifted absorption was observed for PPDI. Remarkably, also the electronic nature of the two materials was affected by the modification at the perylene core, as PPDB is an n-type semiconductor and PPDI has a more pronounced p-type character. A comparative study of perylene side-chain polymers synthesized by a combination of NMRP and “click” chemistry revealed that the compound with improved optical properties (PPDEB) exhibited worse charge carrier mobility compared to PPBI. Another striking result was found as an amorphous polymer bearing OEG side chains showed a better electron mobility than the corresponding material with alkyl chains, which was liquid crystalline. A very high electron mobility of 1∙10E-2 cm2V-1s-1 was measured. The second part of this dissertation addresses fullerene based acceptor materials, among which Phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) is the state-of-the-art n-type semiconductor used in OPV. For two fullerene derivatives, Bis-Phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (bis-PCBM) and Bis-o-quino-dimethane C60 (bis-oQDMC), the LUMO energy levels were higher compared to PCBM. As a result, improved open circuit voltages (Voc) in BHJ solar cells were obtained. The efficiency however did not improve, because of reduced short circuit current densities (Jsc). We found that for the bis-PCBM system, Jsc was limited by low electron transport, while for the bis-oQDMC system an unfavorable blend morphology hampered the performance. The problem of low electron mobility could be overcome by reducing the thickness of the active layer and higher Jsc and overall device performance could be achieved. A drawback of fullerene small molecules is that diffusion, aggregation and crystallization of these molecules within BHJ blends can often negatively affect the stability of the blend morphology and reduce the device performance. We discovered that aggregate and crystallite formation in novel fullerene side chain polymers could be successfully suppressed, whilst high electron mobility and better film properties were achieved. Altogether, new insights into structure-property relation of organic electron transport materials are presented in this work. Moreover, the detailed analysis of charge transport helped to understand the performance of solar cells.
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