Modeling and Optimization of Polymer based Bulk Heterojunction (BH) Solar cell
Date of this Version
12-9-2009Acknowledgements
The work was supported by the Center for Re-Defining Photovoltaic Efficiency through Molecule Scale Control, an Energy Frontier Research Center funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, and Office of Basic Energy Sciences under Award Number DE-SC0001085. The computational resources for this work were provided by the Network of Computational Nanotechnology under NSF Award EEC-0228390.
This document has been peer-reviewed.
Abstract
A polymer phase separation model based on Cahn-Hilliard equation and a three-dimensional (3D) coupled exciton/electron/hole transport model in the disordered, phase-segregated morphology so generated, allow us to predict– possibly for the first time – the morphology dependent performance limits of polymer/fullerene bulk heterostructure (BH) solar cells. We relate the optimum anneal time to polymer sizes, solvent content, film thickness, and anneal temperature and find that a regularization of the morphology can double the efficiency of BH cells.
Keywords
Organic solar cell, Bulk Heterojunction, Process Model, Phase separation
Discipline(s)
Electronic Devices and Semiconductor Manufacturing | Power and Energy