New Materials and Architectures for Organic Solar Cells

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Organic solar cells are widely viewed as having significant potential for delivering low cost solar photovoltaic (PV) power, but currently are not as efficient as other low cost alternatives in converting sunlight to energy.Organic solar cells have great promise in portable power and building integrated applications because of their mechanical flexibility and light weight. These applications require new device architectures and materials with tailored spectral properties.Project innovationThis project investigated and developed new materials and device architectures to improve the efficiency of next generation organic solar cells.It also delivered a new understanding of the basic processes that lead to the creation of electricity from sunlight in organic solar cells.This information is critical to push the efficiency boundaries to a point where commercial viability becomes a reality.The project applied concepts from traditional photovoltaic systems made from inorganic semiconductors, and tested their validity to carbon-based plastic semiconductors.

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