Professor Chen Lie’s Group Collaborates to Make Significant Progress in Semitransparent Organic Solar Cells

(School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering) Recently, Professor Chen Lie’s research group from Nanchang University cooperated to make significant progress in semitransparent organic solar cells (ST-OSCs). A molecular weight-regulated sequential deposition (SD) strategy enables semitransparent organic solar cells with a light utilization efficiency (LUE) of over 5%, which is a breakthrough performance in ST-OSCs.

Comparing with inorganic semiconductors and Perovskite, organic semiconductor materials have the character of discontinuous absorption, which gives them unique advantages in the preparation of ST-OSCs. For ideal ST-OSCs, they should maximize the power conversion efficiency (PCE) by fully using invisible light and improve the average visible transmittance (AVT) through optimizing the transmittance of visible light, so as to increase LUE. (LUE= PCE x AVT) How to balance those parameters is still a great challenge in the development of this field. In response to this issue, Professor Chen Lie leading his team, for the first time, developed a molecular weight-regulated efficient SD strategy to improve the performance of the ST-OSCs. The SD processed PCE10-2F:Y6-based opaque device achieved a record PCE of 14.53%, the greatest efficiency of the active layer of all- narrow bandgap (NBG) polymer donor PCE10-2F. More importantly, a successful balance of PCE and AVT produces a LUE of 5.01%, which is a top value of ST-OSCs without complex optical engineering.

The related research was published online in Energy ＆ Environmental Science, a top journal in energy and environment (IF=39.714) . Huang Xuexiang, a PhD student of Nanchang University, is the first author of the paper. Professor Chen Lie from Nanchang University is the only corresponding author. Professor Han Young Woo's research group from Korea University participated in the project.