2,2-Dicyanovinyl-end-capped oligothiophenes as electron acceptor in solution processed bulk-heterojunction organic solar cells

Three 2,2-dicyanovinyl (DCV) end-capped A-pi-D-pi-A type oligothiophenes (DCV-OTs) containing dithieno[3,2-b: 2',3'-d] silole (DTSi), cyclopenta[1,2-b: 3,4-b'] dithiophene (DTCP) or dithieno[3,2-b: 2',3'-d] pyrrole (DTPy) unit as the central donor part, mono-thiophene as the pi-conjugation bridge were synthesized. The absorption spectroscopies, cyclic voltammetry of these compounds were characterized. Results showed that all these compounds have intensive absorption band over 500-680 nm with a LUMO energy level around -3.80 eV, which is slightly higher than that of [6,6] phenyl-C-61-butyric acid methyl ester (PC61BM, E-LUMO = -4.01 eV), but lower than that of poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT, ELUMO = -2.91 eV). Solution processed bulk heterojunction "all-thiophene'' solar cells using P3HT as electron donor and the above mentioned oligothiophenes as electron acceptor were fabricated and tested. The highest power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 1.31% was achieved for DTSi-cored compound DTSi(THDCV) 2, whereas PTB7: DTSi(THDCV) 2 based device showed slightly higher PCE of 1.56%. Electron mobilities of these three compounds were measured to be around 10 (5) cm(2) V (1) s (1) by space charge limited current method, which is much lower than that of PC61BM, and was considered as one of the reason for the low photovoltaic performance. (C) 2015 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.