TY - JOUR
T1 - Stable solvent for solution-based electrical doping of semiconducting polymer films and its application to organic solar cells
AU - Larrain, Felipe A.
AU - Fuentes-Hernandez, Canek
AU - Chou, Wen Fang
AU - Rodriguez-Toro, Victor A.
AU - Huang, Tzu Yen
AU - Toney, Michael F.
AU - Kippelen, Bernard
N1 - Funding Information:
This research was supported in part by the Center for Organic Photonics and Electronics at Georgia Tech, by the Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research Award No. N00014-14-1-0580 and N00014-16-1-2520, through the MURI Center for Advanced Photovoltaics (CAOP), and by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research through Award No. FA9550-16-1-0168. Also, the use of the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences under Contract No. DE-AC02-76SF00515. We also acknowledge the support of CONICYT (Chilean National Commission for Scientific and Technological Research) through the Doctoral Fellowship program ‘‘Becas Chile’’, Grant No. 72150387 for F. A. L., as well as support from COLCIENCIAS (Colombian Administrative Department of Science, Technology and Innovation) through the program Fulbright-Colciencias for V. A. R.-T., and the support of the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan, Overseas Project for Postdoctoral Research Abroad Program (PRAP) (105-2917-I-564-044). This work was performed in part at the Georgia Tech Institute for Electronics and Nanotechnology, a member of the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure, which is supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant ECCS-1542174).
Funding Information:
This research was supported in part by the Center for Organic Photonics and Electronics at Georgia Tech, by the Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research Award No. N00014-14-1-0580 and N00014-16-1-2520, through the MURI Center for Advanced Photovoltaics (CAOP), and by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research through Award No. FA9550-16-1-0168. Also, the use of the Stanford Synchrotron Radiation Lightsource, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences under Contract No. DE-AC02-76SF00515. We also acknowledge the support of CONICYT (Chilean National Commission for Scientific and Technological Research) through the Doctoral Fellowship program "Becas Chile", Grant No. 72150387 for F. A. L., as well as support from COLCIENCIAS (Colombian Administrative Department of Science, Technology and Innovation) through the program Fulbright-Colciencias for V. A. R.-T., and the support of the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan, Overseas Project for Postdoctoral Research Abroad Program (PRAP) (105-2917-I-564-044). This work was performed in part at the Georgia Tech Institute for Electronics and Nanotechnology, a member of the National Nanotechnology Coordinated Infrastructure, which is supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant ECCS-1542174).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 The Royal Society of Chemistry.
PY - 2018/8
Y1 - 2018/8
N2 - The immersion of polymeric semiconducting films into a polyoxometalate (PMA) solution was found to lead to electrical doping over a limited depth, enabling the fabrication of organic photovoltaic devices with simplified geometry; yet, the technique was highly solvent selective and the use of nitromethane was found to be limiting. Here, we report on the use of acetonitrile as an alternative solvent to nitromethane. Morphology studies on pristine and PMA doped P3HT films suggest that dopants reside in between the lamella of the polymer, but cause no distortion to the P3HT π-π stacking. With this information, we propose an explanation for the observed solvent-selectivity of the doping method. Degradation studies reveal a superior stability of films doped with PMA in acetonitrile. Based on these findings, we believe that the post-process immersion technique, when dissolving PMA in acetonitrile, is a more suitable candidate to conduct solution-based electrical p-doping of organic semiconductors on an industrial scale.
AB - The immersion of polymeric semiconducting films into a polyoxometalate (PMA) solution was found to lead to electrical doping over a limited depth, enabling the fabrication of organic photovoltaic devices with simplified geometry; yet, the technique was highly solvent selective and the use of nitromethane was found to be limiting. Here, we report on the use of acetonitrile as an alternative solvent to nitromethane. Morphology studies on pristine and PMA doped P3HT films suggest that dopants reside in between the lamella of the polymer, but cause no distortion to the P3HT π-π stacking. With this information, we propose an explanation for the observed solvent-selectivity of the doping method. Degradation studies reveal a superior stability of films doped with PMA in acetonitrile. Based on these findings, we believe that the post-process immersion technique, when dissolving PMA in acetonitrile, is a more suitable candidate to conduct solution-based electrical p-doping of organic semiconductors on an industrial scale.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85052134617&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1039/c8ee00811f
DO - 10.1039/c8ee00811f
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85052134617
SN - 1754-5692
VL - 11
SP - 2216
EP - 2224
JO - Energy and Environmental Science
JF - Energy and Environmental Science
IS - 8
ER -