Record indoor performance of organic photovoltaics with long-term stability enabled by self-assembled monolayer-based interface management

Tae Hyuk Kim, Na Won Park, Muhammad Ahsan Saeed, Sang Young Jeong, Han Young Woo, Jae Hong Park, Jae Won Shim

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

25 Scopus citations

Abstract

Though with the advent of the Internet-of-Things state-of-the-art organic photovoltaic (OPV) systems for harnessing indoor light energy have successfully been developed; however, the practical use of OPVs is limited owing to their low power conversion efficiency (PCE) and marginal understanding on the charge dynamics of OPVs under dim indoor lights. Herein, a record-high performance in indoor OPV system is secured by combining a 2-(9 H-carbazol-9-yl) phosphonic acid (2PACz)-processed indium tin oxide (ITO) and a 2PACz-mixed photoactive layer. Charge carrier dynamics of the 2PACz-mixed photoactive layer are systematically investigated to develop efficient indoor OPVs. Spontaneous vertical phase separation of photoreactive layers with 2PACz forms a vertical component distribution and dramatically improves carrier yield-mobility product which yields suppression of trap-assisted recombination and leaking current in the indoor OPVs. Also, phosphonic acid groups-based 2PACz-treated ITO leads to induce a sufficiently large work function owing to a vacuum-level shift, thereby enabling efficient energy-level matching to achieve charge selection enhancement at the hole-selective interface. The champion OPV (∼ 36% PCE under indoor lights) system maintains 95% of its initial efficiency after 1000 h of operation in ambient air. Our findings highlight the tremendous potential of indoor OPVs for simultaneously achieving high efficiency and ambient shelf-lifetime.

Original languageEnglish
Article number108429
JournalNano Energy
Volume112
DOIs
StatePublished - Jul 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korean government (MSIT) (No. 2022R1A2C2009523 , 2020R1F1A107371 , and 2017R1A5A1015365 ). In addition, this study was supported by Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd . ( IO201217–08221-01 ). Lastly, this research was supported by the Technology Innovation Program ( 20011336 ) funded by the Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy (Korea).

Funding Information:
This study was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF) grant funded by the Korean government (MSIT) (No. 2022R1A2C2009523, 2020R1F1A107371, and 2017R1A5A1015365). In addition, this study was supported by Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd. (IO201217–08221-01). Lastly, this research was supported by the Technology Innovation Program (20011336) funded by the Ministry of Trade, Industry, and Energy (Korea).

Publisher Copyright:
© 2023 Elsevier Ltd

Keywords

  • Charge carrier dynamics
  • Charge-selective contacts
  • Indoor organic photovoltaics
  • Interface management
  • Spontaneous vertical phase separation

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