Functional donor polymer semiconductors for hybrid solar cells

有机光伏(OPV)或有机太阳能电池是近年来出现的一种很有前途的将阳光转化为电能的清洁技术。聚合物太阳能电池因其优异的溶液加工性而引起人们的特别兴趣，这可能使太阳能电池的生产成本降低。它们还重量轻、灵活，颜色多样，适合便携式电源和建筑集成光伏(BIPV)等新应用。聚合物太阳能电池的电能转换效率(PCE)，即将阳光转化为电能的能力，在过去几年中得到了显著的提高。然而，聚合物太阳能电池的PCE仍然无法与硅电池等其他传统太阳能电池技术相媲美。聚合物太阳能电池研究最具挑战性的方面在于开发使能光活性材料。在典型的聚合物太阳能电池中，由聚合物电子给体和小分子电子受体组成的光活化层是将光子转化为电能的最基本的部件。现有的聚合物太阳能电池的施主和受主材料在可加工性、纳米结构控制、光捕获和电荷传输等方面存在一定的局限性，导致电池性能较差。这项研究计划通过开发聚合物混合太阳能电池来解决这些问题，该电池结合了聚合物材料(出色的加工性和机械稳定性)和无机半导体材料(高电气性能)的积极特性。这项研究致力于设计和合成一类新型的功能施主聚合物半导体，它具有优良的可加工性，可用于高通量生产，具有良好的光学特性，可最大限度地收集光，并具有高电学性能，可用于电荷产生和传输。这种新型给体聚合物的性能是高效聚合物混合太阳能电池的理想选择。

Organic photovoltaics (OPVs) or organic solar cells have emerged in recent years as a promising clean technology to convert sunlight into electricity. Polymer-based solar cells are of particular interest due to their excellent solution processability, which potentially enables low cost production of solar cells. They are also lightweight, flexible, and of varied colors, making them suitable for new applications such as portable power and building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV). The power conversion efficiency (PCE), the ability of converting sunlight to electricity, for polymer solar cells has been improved dramatically over the past few years. However the PCE of polymer solar cells is still not comparable to other conventional solar cell technologies such as silicon cells. The most challenging aspect for the polymer solar cell research lies in the development of enabling photoactive materials. In a typical polymer solar cell, the photoactive layer comprising a polymer electron donor and a small molecule electron acceptor is the most essential component for converting photons to electricity. The existing donor and acceptor materials for polymer solar cells have certain limitations in terms of processability, nanostructure control, light harvesting, and charge transport, and are responsible for the poor cell performance. This research program addresses these issues through developing polymer hybrid solar cells that combine the positive characteristics of the polymer materials (excellent processability and mechanical robustness) and the inorganic semiconductor materials (high electrical performance). The research focuses on the design and synthesis of a new class of functional donor polymer semiconductors with excellent processability for high throughput production, desirable optical characteristics for maximum light harvesting, and high electrical performance for charge generation and transport. The properties of this new type of donor polymers are ideal for high efficiency polymer hybrid solar cells.