Fabrication, Optical Modeling, and Color Characterization of Semitransparent Bulk-Heterojunction Organic Solar Cells in an Inverted Structure

• Published in: Advanced functional materials Vol. 20; no. 10; pp. 1592 - 1598
• Main Authors: Ameri, Tayebeh, Dennler, Gilles, Waldauf, Christoph, Azimi, Hamed, Seemann, Andrea, Forberich, Karen, Hauch, Jens, Scharber, Markus, Hingerl, Kurt, Brabec, Christoph J.
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Weinheim WILEY-VCH Verlag 25-05-2010; WILEY‐VCH Verlag; Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
• Subjects: and color; Buckminsterfullerene; Color; Computational efficiency; Computing time; Devices; Fullerenes; Heterojunctions; Human; inverted structure; Materials science; Mathematical models; optical simulation; organic solar cells; Photodiodes; Photovoltaic cells; semitransparent; Simulation; Solar cells
• ISSN: 1616-301X; 1616-3028; 1616-3028
• DOI: 10.1002/adfm.201000176

Semitransparent inverted organic photodiodes are fabricated with a Baytron PH500 ethylene‐glycol layer/silver grid as the top electrode. Reasonable performances are obtained under both rear‐ and front‐side illumination and efficiencies up to 2% are achieved. Some light is shed on visual prospects through optical simulations for a semitransparent device of poly(3‐hexylthiophene) (P3HT) and the C60 derivative 1‐(3‐methoxycarbonyl)propyl‐1‐phenyl[6,6]C71 (PC70BM) in the inverted structure. These calculations allow the maximum efficiency achievable to be predicted for semitransparent cells based on P3HT:PC70BM versus the transparency perception for a human eye. The simulations suggest that low‐bandgap materials such as poly[2,6‐(4,4‐bis‐(2‐ethylhexyl)‐4H‐cyclopenta[2,1‐b;3,4‐b′]dithiophene)‐alt‐4,7‐(2,1,3‐benzothiadiazole)] (PCPDTBT) have a better potential for semitransparent devices. In addition, the color range recognized by the human eye is predicted by the optical simulation for some semitransparent devices including different active layers.
A semitransparent inverted organic photodiode is successfully fabricated with a Baytron PH500 layer/silver grid as the top electrode. Reasonable performances are achieved under both rear‐ and front‐side illumination. The maximum efficiency achievable in semitransparent cells based on P3HT:PC70BM is predicted versus the transparency perception for human eye. Optical simulations suggest that low‐bandgap materials have a better potential for semitransparent devices.