Investigation of Performance and Stability of Organic Solar Cells Fabricated by Incorporating Carbon Nanostructures in both Hole Transport and Active Layers

Abstract

Photovoltaic technology is the best solution for supporting humankind to face the alarming energy concerns mounting all over the world, and the organic solar cells (OSCs) which belong to the latest generation photovoltaic technology are of substantial research interest due to their plentiful advantages. However, in a race to take strong control over the global markets, the OSCs are still far behind commercialization due to their low power conversion efficiency (PCE), and degradation of organic materials. The incorporation of materials with exceptional physical properties in the device architecture can significantly improve the performance of the OSCs, and in this regard, applications of carbon nanostructures such as carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and graphene have been considered. Carbon nanostructures and their composites with conductive polymers have been synthesized by simple techniques for their applications in the hole transport layer and the active layer of OSCs. The remarkable modifications observed in the physical properties of the composites have resulted in a significant enhancement in the PCE of composites based OSCs. Periodical measurements of electrical properties of the OSCs performing under different environments have revealed substantial improvement in the stability of the composites based OSCs, despite the degradation of device materials. The effects of temperature on device parameters have been investigated and the composites based OSCs have been noticed to be performing better. The reproducibility of both the performance and the stability of all the OSCs has also been carefully investigated. The brief comparative study presented in this research can substantially motivate scientific communities to consider the remarkable applications of carbon nanostructures in advancing not only OSCs but also other organic optoelectronic devices for the benefit of future generations.