Facilely full-end-capping engineering promotes high-performance organic solar cells with simultaneously improved efficiency and stability

• Published in: Chemical engineering journal (Lausanne, Switzerland : 1996) Switzerland : 1996), 2023-02, Vol.457, p.141343, Article 141343
• Main Authors: Zhang, Youhui, Deng, Jiawei, Mao, Qilong, Young Jeong, Sang, Huang, Xuexiang, Zhang, Lifu, Lee, Byongkyu, Huang, Bin, Young Woo, Han, Yang, Changduk, Xu, Junying, Wu, Feiyan, Cao, Qian-Yong, Chen, Lie
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Efficiency; Full-end-capping engineering; Organic solar cells; Stability
• ISSN: 1385-8947; 1873-3212
• DOI: 10.1016/j.cej.2023.141343

[Display omitted] •Full-end-capping engineering is a simple and versatile strategy to reduce carrier traps and improve efficiency.•The efficiency of PM6-T:Y6 device and PM6-T:BTP-eC9 device reached 17.11% and 18.45%, respectively.•Full-end-capped polymer donors possess better stability than PM6. Main-chain construction and side-chain modification are general strategies to design polymer donors for organic solar cell (OSCs), but they always suffer from deliberate molecular design and tedious synthesis. Here, we employ full-end-capping engineering, a facile and versatile strategy to boost both efficiency and stability for non-fullerene OSCs. A series of full-end-capped polymer donors are obtained by a simple end-capping reaction right after the polymerization in one-pot. It is found that the end-capping groups not only completely remove the unreacted terminal defects in the polymer chains, but also well-manipulate the molecular orientation, film-forming process and resulting morphology, optimize the charge dynamics, and reduce non-radiative energy loss. The device with full-end-capped PM6-T:Y6-based obtains an impressive efficiency of 17.11%, showing all-over improved device parameters and long-term stability than unend-capped PM6:Y6-based device (15.96%). Notably, PM6-T:BTP-eC9-based device reaches a efficacy of 18.45%, among the highest performance of BTP-eC9-based devices.