The impact of the buffer layer material and active layer thickness on the performance of a fullerene-free organic solar cell

Abstract

This paper presents a step-by-step study of an organic solar cell structure by simulation. The study focuses mainly on the effect of buffer layer material on the performance of a fullerene-free organic solar cell. The studied structure composed of PBDB-T: ITIC polymer donor/small molecule acceptor blend active layer, was selected based on its considerably good power conversion efficiency compared to its peers, it has been proven that the small molecular compound ITIC performed better than the fullerene PC71BM. [1] Compared to available experimental data of the studied structure, simulation results showed an error of 2.05%, and based on that, starting from a power conversion efficiency of 11.44% we continued our study by varying buffer layer materials, and thicknesses of the active layer and interlayers thus achieving an efficiency of 12.25%.