Nonfullerene-Acceptor All-Small-Molecule Organic Solar Cells Based on Highly Twisted Perylene Bisimide with an Efficiency of over 6.

Two twisted singly linked perylene bisimide (PBI) dimers with chalcogen bridges in the PBI cores, named C4,4-SdiPBI-S and C4,4-SdiPBI-Se, were synthesized as acceptors for nonfullerene all-small-molecule organic solar cells (NF all-SMSCs). A moderate-band-gap small-molecule DR3TBDTT used as the electron donor displayed complementary absorption with C4,4-SdiPBI-S and C4,4-SdiPBI-Se. It was found that solvent-vapor annealing (SVA) played a critical role in the photovoltaic performance in NF all-SMSCs, which improves the crystallinity of the donor and acceptors, promotes the proper phase segregation domain size, and therefore enhances charge transport. The power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) of NF all-SMSC devices based on DR3TBDTT/C4,4-SdiPBI-S and DR3TBDTT/C4,4-SdiPBI-Se increased from 2.52% to 5.81% (JSC = 11.12 mA cm-2, VOC = 0.91 V, and FF = 57.32%) and from 2.65% to 6.22% (JSC = 11.55 mA cm-2, VOC = 0.92 V, and FF = 58.72%), respectively, after exposure to chloroform vapor. The best efficiency of 6.22% is one of the highest PCEs for NF all-SMSC-based PBI acceptors so far. The studies illustrate that highly efficient NF all-SMSCs can be achieved by using a PBI acceptor with a suitable SVA process.