Improvement of polymer/fullerene solar cells by controlling geometry of the ITO substrate surface

We have found that the short-circuit current, Jsc, of polymer/fullerene [RR-P3HT/C60] solar cells has a clear dependence on the surface roughness of the ITO/glass substrate. We prepared an ITO surface with an average roughness, Ra, of 0.7–11 nm by chemical etching. At first Jsc increases with the increase in ITO surface roughness and then gradually decreases. The maximum performance was obtained at Ra≈4 nm. Jsc is also high with a very flat surface of Ra=0.7 nm. This feature can be attributed to the trade-off between the increase in absorption light path length and film-quality deterioration.