Most efficient polymer solar cells are usually fabricated from toxic organic solvents, such as chloroform, chlorobenzene, or dichlorobenzene (ODCB). Here, we demonstrate a power conversion efficiency of 4.5% in solar cells with a new blue polymer poly[2,3-bis-(3-octyloxyphenyl)quinoxaline-5,8-diyl-alt-thiophene-2,5-diyl] (TQ1) mixed with PC71BM and processed from mixed solvents of toluene and ODCB in a ratio of 9:1. Decreasing the content of ODCB makes device processing more compatible with the environment for large scale production, with 10% reduction of photocurrent compared to devices from pure ODCB under optimized conditions. In addition, less variation of photocurrent is obtained in solar cells processed from mixed solvents than from pure ODCB due to varying nanostructure in the blends, which is also critical for production.
Spin-coated thin films of poly[(9,9-dioctylfluorenyl-2,7-diyl)-co-5,5-(4',7'-di-2-thienyl-2',1',3'-benzothiadiazole)] (APFO-3) blended with [6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) are used as the active material in polymer photovoltaic cells. Such blends are known for their tendency to phase separate during film formation. Tuning the morphology of the blend in a controlled way is one possible road towards higher efficiency. We studied the effect of adding chlorobenzene to chloroform-based blend solutions before spin-coating on the conversion efficiency of APFO-3:PCBM photodiodes, and related that to the lateral and vertical morphology of thin films of the blend. The lateral morphology is imaged by atomic force microscopy (AFM) and the vertical compositional profile is obtained by dynamic secondary ion mass spectrometry (SIMS). The profiles reveal compositional variations consisting of multilayers of alternating polymer-rich and PCBM-rich domains in the blend film spin-coated from chloroform. The vertical compositional variations are caused by surface-directed spinodal waves and are frozen in during the rapid evaporation of a highly volatile solvent. With addition of the low-vapour pressure solvent chlorobenzene, a more homogeneous vertical composition is found. The conversion efficiency for solar cells of this blend was found to be optimal for chloroform:chlorobenzene mixtures with a volume-ratio of 80:1. We have also investigated the role of the substrate on the morphology. We found that blend films spin-coated from chloroform solutions on PEDOT:PSS-coated ITO show a similar compositional structure as the films on silicon, and that changing the substrate from silicon to gold only affects the vertical phase separation in a region close to the substrate interface.
We report on transistors and light-emitting diodes using a conjugated polymer consisting of alternated segments of fluorene units and low-band gap donor-acceptor-donor (D-A-D) units. The D-A-D segment includes two electron-donating thiophene rings combined with a thiadiazolo-quinoxaline unit, which is electron withdrawing to its nature. The resulting polymer is conjugated and has a band gap of around 1.27 eV. Here we present the corresponding electro- and photoluminescence spectra, which both peak at approximately 1 micrometer. Single layer light-emitting diodes demonstrated external quantum efficiencies from 0.03% to 0.05%. The polymer was employed as active material in thin film transistors, a field-effect mobility of 0.003 cm2/Vs and current on/off ratio of 104 were achieved at ambient atmosphere.
We present in this article some studies of the chemical reactivity of free metal clusters (~8-50 atoms) investigated at single-collision-like conditions in a molecular beam experiment. A beam of clusters is generated with a pulsed laser vaporization source and after expansion into vacuum the cluster beam passes collision cells, in which the clusters can make one or a few collisions with reactive gas molecules. Pure clusters and reaction products are detected with laser ionization and mass spectrometry. A strong size dependence in the reaction probability of N2 with tungsten clusters is observed. When the temperature of the cluster source is lowered from room temperature to 80 K the reactivity increases strongly and N2 adsorbs in a weakly bound molecular state, whereas only a strongly bound dissociative state is stable at room temperature. The reactivity of platinum clusters with O2 is much less size dependent and the reaction probability is high on all investigated sizes. If the PtnOm products pass a second cell containing H2(D2) the number of adsorbed oxygen atoms decreases with increasing H2 pressure. This is explained by formation of water molecules in a catalytic reaction on the surface of the Pt clusters.
The size-dependent reactivity of several transition-metal clusters: Con, Nbn, Rhn, and Wn with CO has been investigated in a cluster beam experiment. The reactions occur at single-collision-like conditions and the results are evaluated in terms of the reaction probability (S) in a collision. For all the four metals, clusters with more than 10 - 15 atoms show a high reaction probability, S >= 0.4, rather independent of size. For smaller Nbn and Wn, the reaction probability is lower, and for Nbn, large variations in the CO reactivity are observed in the n equals 8 - 13 range with a distinct minimum at Nb10. Using an LCAO approach within the local spin density approximation (LSDA) the adsorption of molecular CO on Nbn has also been investigated theoretically. The geometries of the bare clusters were optimized and two different sites for CO were investigated. The discussion is based on a detailed analysis of Nb4. The calculations show that compact structures with high coordination numbers are the most stable ones for the bare Nb clusters and hollow sites, also maximizing the coordination, are preferred for CO adsorption. The calculations indicate that a high CO-Nbn bond strength is obtained for clusters with a high density of states close to the Fermi level and for which the HOMO level has a symmetry that allows for an efficient back-donation of electrons to the 2(pi) *-orbital of CO. A particularly low chemisorption energy was calculated for the Nb10 cluster.
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