ACS Photonics
ACS Photonics
5 years ago

Plasmonic Organic Photovoltaics: Unraveling Plasmonic Enhancement for Realistic Cell Geometries

Plasmonic Organic Photovoltaics: Unraveling Plasmonic Enhancement for Realistic Cell Geometries
Keyur K. Gandhi, Panos Patsalas, Michail J. Beliatis, Ioannis Vangelidis, S. Ravi P. Silva, Anna Theodosi, Stergios Logothetidis, Elefterios Lidorikis, Argiris Laskarakis
Incorporating plasmonic nanoparticles in organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices can increase the optical thickness of the organic absorber layer while keeping its physical thickness small. However, trade-offs between various structure parameters have caused contradictions regarding the effectiveness of plasmonics in the literature, that have somewhat stunted the progressing of a unified theoretical understanding for practical applications. We examine the optical enhancement mechanisms of practical PCDTBT:PC70BM OPV cells incorporating metal nanoparticles. The plasmonic near- and far-field contributions are differentiated, with spectrum- and space-wide current enhancements found in the plasmon scattering regime and spectrum- and space-specific current enhancements in the near-field regime. A remarkable system complexity is revealed, where the plasmonic enhancement trends change and even reverse by simple changes in the device geometry. This accounts for many of the contradictory results published in the literature on plasmonic effects in OPVs. By exploring the full structural parameter phase-space we are able to now propose a unified representation that intuitively explains literature findings and trends. Our results show that an already optimized PCDTBT:PC70BM cell can be further optically enhanced by plasmonic effects by at least 20% with the incorporation of Ag nanoparticles.

Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/acsphotonics.7b01390

DOI: 10.1021/acsphotonics.7b01390

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