Sputtered nickel oxide thin film for efficient hole transport layer in polymer–fullerene bulk-heterojunction organic solar cell

Bulk-heterojunction (BHJ) organic photovoltaics (OPV) are very promising thin film renewable energy conversion technologies due to low production cost by high-throughput roll-to-roll manufacturing, an expansive list of compatible materials, and flexible device fabrication. An important aspect of OPV device efficiency is good contact engineering. The use of oxide thin films for this application offers increased design flexibility and improved chemical stability. Here we present our investigation of radio frequency magnetron sputtered nickel oxide (NiOx) deposited from oxide targets as an efficient, easily scalable hole transport layer (HTL) with variable work-function, ranging from 4.8 to 5.8 eV. Differences in HTL work-function were not found to result in statistically significant changes in open circuit voltage (Voc) for poly(3-hexylthiophene):[6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (P3HT:PCBM) BHJ device. Ultraviolet photoemission spectroscopy (UPS) characterization of the NiOx film and its interface with the polymer shows Fermi level alignment of the polymer with the NiOx film. UPS of the blend also demonstrates Fermi level alignment of the organic active layer with the HTL, consistent with the lack of correlation between Voc and HTL work-function. Instead, trends in jsc, Voc, and thus overall device performance are related to the surface treatment of the HTL prior to active layer deposition through changes in active layer thickness.