Simulation of the performance of organic solar cells based on D1-BT-EDOT-BT-D2-A/PCBM structures

Moulay Ismail University, Research team: Modeling, Materials and Systems Control (MMSC). Research laboratory: Computer Engineering and Intelligent Electrical Systems (2ISEI). High School of Technology Meknes (ESTM) BP: 3103, Toulal, Meknes, Morocco

^* Corresponding author: i.elmhamedi@edu.umi.ac.ma; a.elkarkri@edu.umi.ac.ma

Abstract

The analysis of microelectronic and photonic structures-one dimension (AMPS-1D) was used to study and simulate the performance of organic heterojunction solar cells based on D1 –B-Edot-B-D2-A as electron donors, and [6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM) as an electron acceptor. The organic photovoltaic cell devices using T3-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM showed the improved open-circuit voltage Voc, short-circuit current density Jsc, fill factor FF, and power conversion efficiency PCE values for the optimum thickness of 120 nm and the effective state density of electrons and holes of 10²¹cm⁻³.The P3-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM and P3-B-Edot-B-P3-A/PCBM based devices exhibited a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 9.295% and 8.735%, respectively, which outperformed the corresponding T3-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM, Cbz-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM, F-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM, and A-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM based devices (7.330, 6.622, 7.226, and 7.327%). More importantly, the P3-B-Edot-B-T3-A/PCBM and P3-B-Edot-B-P3-A/PCBM -based device delivered the highest PCE of 14.432% and 15.031% respectively, when we deposit a layer of PEDOT between the indium tin oxide (ITO) and the active layer, which is a clear improvement over other results in the literature.