Band Bending in Conjugated Polymer Films: Role of Morphology and Implications for Bulk Charge Transport Characteristics

J. K. Wenderott, Ban Xuan Dong, Peter F. Green

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

18 Scopus Citations

Abstract

The performance of power conversion devices is impacted by the energy level alignment at the interface between the conjugated polymer and conductive substrate. While band bending has been known to vary between conjugated polymers, we show that the degree of band bending within the same polymer can be just as significant with morphology change. Specifically, a significant band bending effect, studied via Kelvin probe force microscopy (KPFM), was exhibited by poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) films fabricated using matrix assisted pulsed laser evaporation (MAPLE) in contrast to the conventional spin-cast P3HT films. This finding is associated with a broadening of the density of states (DOS) in the MAPLE-deposited P3HT films, originating from the more disordered structure of the film. These findings, to the best of our knowledge, illustrate for the first time a strong connection between morphology, energy level alignment, and bulk transport in conjugated polymer films.

Original languageAmerican English
Pages (from-to)7446-7451
Number of pages6
JournalJournal of Materials Chemistry C
Volume5
Issue number30
DOIs
StatePublished - 2017

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© The Royal Society of Chemistry 2017.

NREL Publication Number

  • NREL/JA-5A00-69125

Keywords

  • bulk transport
  • conjugated polymer films
  • energy level alignment
  • morphology

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