Synthesis and photovoltaic properties of a simple non-fused small molecule acceptor

Abstract In this work, a new non-fused small molecule acceptor Ph-IC based on alkoxyl benzene and IC units was synthesized for photovoltaic applications. The small molecule Ph-IC has a very simple chemical structure and is easily synthesized. Benefited from the coplanar conjugated structure, the O-H and S-H non-covalent interactions, Ph-IC exhibits a narrow optical bandgap of 1.62 eV and a medium electron mobility of 1.84 × 10 −4 cm 2 V −1 s −1 . When using Ph-IC as acceptor and a wide-bandgap polymer PBFTZ as donor, the devices show a maximum PCE of 5.68% with V oc of 0.89 V, J sc of 12.37 mA cm −2 and FF of 51.5% under the illumination of AM 1.5 G at 100 mW/cm 2 . This work demonstrates that the simple-structured and low cost non-fused group can also be used as building blocks in high performation n -OS acceptors.