Plasmonic Forward Scattering Effect in Organic Solar Cells: A Powerful Optical Engineering Method

In this report, plasmonic effects in organic photovoltaic cells (OPVs) are systematically analyzed using size-controlled silver nanoparticles (AgNPs, diameter: 10 ~ 100 nm), which were incorporated into the anodic buffer layer, poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly(styrenesulfonate) (PEDOT:PSS). The optical properties of AgNPs tuned by size considerably influence the performance levels of devices. The power conversion efficiency (PCE) was increased from 6.4% to 7.6% in poly[N-9-hepta-decanyl-2,7-carbazole-alt-5,5-(4,7-di-2-thienyl-2,1,3-benzothiadiazole)] (PCDTBT):[6,6]-phenyl C(71)-butyric acid methyl ester (PC(70)BM) based-OPVs and from 7.9% to 8.6% in polythieno[3,4-b]thiophene/benzodithiophene (PTB7):PC(70)BM based-OPVs upon embedding the AgNPs. The external quantum efficiency (EQE) was significantly enhanced by the absorption enhancement due to the plasmonic scattering effect. Finally, we verified the origin of the size-dependent plasmonic forwarding scattering effect of the AgNPs by visualizing the scattering field with near-field optical microscopy (NSOM) and through analytic optical simulations.