1. |
- Alsufyani, Maryam, et al.
(författare)
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The effect of aromatic ring size in electron deficient semiconducting polymers for n-type organic thermoelectrics
- 2020
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Ingår i: Journal of Materials Chemistry C. - : ROYAL SOC CHEMISTRY. - 2050-7526 .- 2050-7534. ; 8:43, s. 15150-15157
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- N-type semiconducting polymers have been recently utilized in thermoelectric devices, however they have typically exhibited low electrical conductivities and poor device stability, in contrast to p-type semiconductors, which have been much higher performing. This is due in particular to the n-type semiconductors low doping efficiency, and poor charge carrier mobility. Strategies to enhance the thermoelectric performance of n-type materials include optimizing the electron affinity (EA) with respect to the dopant to improve the doping process and increasing the charge carrier mobility through enhanced molecular packing. Here, we report the design, synthesis and characterization of fused electron-deficient n-type copolymers incorporating the electron withdrawing lactone unit along the backbone. The polymers were synthesized using metal-free aldol condensation conditions to explore the effect of enlarging the central phenyl ring to a naphthalene ring, on the electrical conductivity. When n-doped with N-DMBI, electrical conductivities of up to 0.28 S cm(-1), Seebeck coefficients of -75 mu V K-1 and maximum Power factors of 0.16 mu W m(-1) K-2 were observed from the polymer with the largest electron affinity of -4.68 eV. Extending the aromatic ring reduced the electron affinity, due to reducing the density of electron withdrawing groups and subsequently the electrical conductivity reduced by almost two orders of magnitude.
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2. |
- Chen, Hu, et al.
(författare)
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Acene Ring Size Optimization in Fused Lactam Polymers Enabling High n-Type Organic Thermoelectric Performance
- 2021
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Ingår i: Journal of the American Chemical Society. - : AMER CHEMICAL SOC. - 0002-7863 .- 1520-5126. ; 143:1, s. 260-268
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Three n-type fused lactam semiconducting polymers were synthesized for thermoelectric and transistor applications via a cheap, highly atom-efficient, and nontoxic transition-metal free aldol polycondensation. Energy level analysis of the three polymers demonstrated that reducing the central acene core size from two anthracenes (A-A), to mixed naphthalene-anthracene (A-N), and two naphthalene cores (N-N) resulted in progressively larger electron affinities, thereby suggesting an increasingly more favorable and efficient solution doping process when employing 4-(2,3-dihydro-1,3-dimethyl-1H-benzimidazol-2-yl)-N,N-dimethylbenzenamine (N-DMBI) as the dopant. Meanwhile, organic field effect transistor (OFET) mobility data showed the N-N and A-N polymers to feature the highest charge carrier mobilities, further highlighting the benefits of aryl core contraction to the electronic performance of the materials. Ultimately, the combination of these two factors resulted in N-N, A-N, and A-A to display power factors (PFs) of 3.2 mu W m(-1) K-2, 1.6 mu W m(-1 )K(-2), and 0.3 mu W m(-1) K-2, respectively, when doped with N-DMBI, whereby the PFs recorded for N-N and A-N are among the highest reported in the literature for n-type polymers. Importantly, the results reported in this study highlight that modulating the size of the central acene ring is a highly effective molecular design strategy to optimize the thermoelectric performance of conjugated polymers, thus also providing new insights into the molecular design guidelines for the next generation of high-performance n-type materials for thermoelectric applications.
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3. |
- Clarke, Andrew J., et al.
(författare)
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Non-fullerene acceptor photostability and its impact on organic solar cell lifetime
- 2021
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Ingår i: Cell Reports Physical Science. - : Elsevier. - 2666-3864. ; 2:7
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The development of non-fullerene acceptors (NFAs) has facilitated the realization of efficient organic solar cells (OSCs) with minimal burn-in losses and excellent long-term stability. However, the role of NFA molecular structures on device stability remains unclear, limiting commercialization of NFA-based OSCs. Herein, the photostability of 10 OSC devices, fabricated with various NFAs (O-IDTBR, EH-IDTBR, ITIC, and ITIC-M) blended with donor polymers (PTB7-Th, PffBT4T-2OD, and PBDB-T), is investigated. O-IDTBR and EH-IDTBR form highly stable devices with all three polymers, whereas ITIC and ITIC-M devices suffer from burn-in losses and long-term degradation. Conformational instability is found to be responsible for the poor photostability of ITIC and ITIC-M, resulting in poor device stability. Twisting and potential breakage of the chemical bond that links the end group to the main backbone of ITIC and ITIC-M molecules causes undesirable conformational changes. Potential strategies to overcome such detrimental photo-induced conformational changes in NFAs are proposed.
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4. |
- Marks, Adam, et al.
(författare)
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Synthetic Nuances to Maximize n-Type Organic Electrochemical Transistor and Thermoelectric Performance in Fused Lactam Polymers
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of the American Chemical Society. - : American Chemical Society (ACS). - 0002-7863 .- 1520-5126. ; 144:10, s. 4642-4656
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- A series of fully fused n-type mixed conduction lactam polymers p(g(7)NC(n)N), systematically increasing the alkyl side chain content, are synthesized via an inexpensive, nontoxic, precious-metal-free aldol polycondensation. Employing these polymers as channel materials in organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs) affords state-of-the-art n-type performance with p(g(7)NC(10)N) recording an OECT electron mobility of 1.20 x 10(-2) cm(2) V-1 s(-1) and a mu C* figure of merit of 1.83 F cm(-1) V-1 s(-1). In parallel to high OECT performance, upon solution doping with (4-(1,3-dimethyl-2,3-dihydro-1H-benzoimidazol-2-yl)phenyl)dimethylamine (N-DMBI), the highest thermoelectric performance is observed for p(g(7)NC(4)N), with a maximum electrical conductivity of 7.67 S cm(-1) and a power factor of 10.4 mu Wm(-1) K-2. These results are among the highest reported for n-type polymers. Importantly, while this series of fused polylactam organic mixed ionic-electronic conductors (OMIECs) highlights that synthetic molecular design strategies to bolster OECT performance can be translated to also achieve high organic thermoelectric (OTE) performance, a nuanced synthetic approach must be used to optimize performance. Herein, we outline the performance metrics and provide new insights into the molecular design guidelines for the next generation of high-performance n-type materials for mixed conduction applications, presenting for the first time the results of a single polymer series within both OECT and OTE applications.
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