Novel Small Four-armed Molecules with Triphenylamine-bridged Structure for Organic Solar Cells Featuring High Open-circuit Voltage

In view of few attention on star-shaped molecules containing triphenylamine(TPA) unit as π-linker, a series of small four-armed molecules, consisting of octyloxy-substituted 2,1,3-benzothiadiazole(DOBT) or 4-octyl-2-thienyl functionalized DOBT as the core, TPA as π-bridge and 4-methylphenyl or 4-methoxyphenyl groups as terminal units, was designed and synthesized. The effects of π-bridges and substitute groups on molecular photoelectric performance and photovoltaic performance were fully explored. With the help of the additional thiophene-linkers incorporation, 3-octylthienyl substituted molecule with end-capping 4-methylphenyl(T-BTTPAM) and 3-octylthienyl substituted molecule with end-capping 4-methoxyphenyl(T-BTTPAOM) showed stronger and broader absorption, as well as higher charge mobilities compared to the molecules without thiophene-linkers(BTTPAM and BTTPAOM). Additionally, changing substitute groups from methyl to methoxy helped BTTPAOM and T-BTTPAOM achieve better absorption properties than BTTPAM and T-BTTPAM, respectively. When paired with PC₆₁BM as the electron acceptor to fabricate solution-processed photovoltaic devices, the four materials gave high open-circuit voltage(V_oc) values over 0.90 V. These results demonstrate that our materials are promising candidates as donor materials for organic solar cells(OSCs), and further device optimization is in progress in our laboratory.