An Open‐Circuit Voltage and Power Conversion Efficiency Study of Fullerene Ternary Organic Solar Cells Based on Oligomer/Oligomer and Oligomer/Polymer

Variations in the open‐circuit voltage (V _oc) of ternary organic solar cells are systematically investigated. The initial study of these devices consists of two electron‐donating oligomers, S2 (two units) and S7 (seven units), and the electron‐accepting 6,6]‐phenyl C71 butyric acid methyl ester (PC₇₁BM) and reveals that the V _oc is continuously tunable due to the changing energy of the charge transfer state (E _ct) of the active layers. Further investigation suggests that V _oc is also continuously tunable upon change in E _ct in a ternary blend system that consists of S2 and its corresponding polymer (P11):PC₇₁BM. It is interesting to note that higher power conversion efficiencies can be obtained for both S2:S7:PC₇₁BM and S2:P11:PC₇₁BM ternary systems compared with their binary systems, which can be ascribed to an improved V _oc due to the higher E _ct and an improved fill factor due to the improved film morphology upon the incorporation of S2. These findings provide a new guideline for the future design of conjugated polymers for achieving higher performance of ternary organic solar cells.