B.2 Hybrid bulk solar cells
Stipendiat: Michael Eck
Within this project hybrid bulk heterojunction solar cells are investigated. Hybrid solar cells are a part of the 3rd generation solar cells and are deriving from purely organic solar cells. However, this type of solar cells is using a combination of organic conjugated polymers and inorganic semiconducting materials (such as e.g. nanocrystals) typically serving as electron donor and as electron acceptor respectively. An improvement of their performance is targeted by exploiting the advantages of inorganic materials such as e. g. simple production, band gap tuning, high intrinsic electron mobility and controllable particle morphology. An increased charge transport and efficient exciton dissociation within the photoactive electron harvesting layer is of fundamental importance for the improvement of the solar cell performance. Therefore surface treatment of the inorganic nanocrystals as well as the creation of a controlled donor-acceptor morphology by using nanostructuring techniques is applied. It is also targeted to develop the practical use of hybrid solar cells by investigations about life time, increased solar cell size, creation of solar cell modules and improvement of the solar cell parameters for an optimal integration to micro electric energy storage and converter circuits and integration into MEMS devices.
Figure: (a) Schematic structure of a hybrid solar cell. (b) Picture of a test solar cell, fabricated in our lab. (c) Working principle.