See discussions, stats, and author profiles for this publication at: https://www.researchgate.

net/publication/257534085

Geometric light trapping with a V-trap for efficient organic solar cells

Article in Optics Express · May 2013

DOI: 10.1364/OE.21.00A305 · Source: PubMed

CITATIONS READS
26 914

6 authors, including:

Mark L Brongersma Michael D. Mcgehee

Stanford University Stanford University
425 PUBLICATIONS 43,965 CITATIONS 341 PUBLICATIONS 56,731 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE SEE PROFILE

Peter Peumans
imec
78 PUBLICATIONS 17,179 CITATIONS

SEE PROFILE

Some of the authors of this publication are also working on these related projects:

Perovskite Tandem Solar Cells View project

Organic Photovoltaics View project

All content following this page was uploaded by Mark L Brongersma on 18 August 2014.

The user has requested enhancement of the downloaded file.

 Geometric light trapping with a V-trap for
efficient organic solar cells
Soo Jin Kim,1,* George Y. Margulis,2 Seung-Bum Rim,1 Mark L. Brongersma,2
Michael D. McGehee,2 and Peter Peumans3
1
Department of Electrical Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA
2
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305 USA
3
Department of Bio-Nano Electronics, IMEC, Kapeldreef 75, B-3001 Leuven, Belgium
*
kimsj@stanford.edu

Abstract: The efficiency of today’s most efficient organic solar cells is

primarily limited by the ability of the active layer to absorb all the sunlight.
While internal quantum efficiencies exceeding 90% are common, the
external quantum efficiency rarely exceeds 70%. Light trapping techniques
that increase the ability of a given active layer to absorb light are common
in inorganic solar cells but have only been applied to organic solar cells
with limited success. Here, we analyze the light trapping mechanism for a
cell with a V-shape substrate configuration and demonstrate significantly
improved photon absorption in an 5.3%-efficient PCDTBT:PC70BM bulk
heterojunction polymer solar cell. The measured short circuit current
density improves by 29%, in agreement with model predictions, and the
power conversion efficiency increases to 7.2%, a 35% improvement over
the performance in the absence of a light trap.
©2013 Optical Society of America
OCIS codes: (350.0350) Other areas of optics; (350.6050) Solar energy.

References and links

1. S. H. Park, A. Roy, S. Beaupre, S. Cho, N. Coates, J. S. Moon, D. Moses, M. Leclerc, K. Lee, and A. J. Heeger,
“Bulk heterojunction solar cells with internal quantum efficiency approaching 100%,” Nat. Photonics 3(5), 297–
302 (2009).
2. H. Y. Chen, J. Hou, S. Zhang, Y. Liang, G. Yang, Y. Yang, L. Yu, Y. Wu, and G. Li, “Polymer solar cells with
enhanced open-circuit voltage and efficiency,” Nat. Photonics 3(11), 649–653 (2009).
3. N. Blouin, A. Michaud, and M. Leclerc, “A Low-Bandgap Poly(2,7-Carbazole) Derivative for Use in High-
Performance Solar Cells,” Adv. Mater. 19(17), 2295–2300 (2007).
4. J. Peet, J. Y. Kim, N. E. Coates, W. L. Ma, D. Moses, A. J. Heeger, and G. C. Bazan, “Efficiency enhancement
in low-bandgap polymer solar cells by processing with alkane dithiols,” Nat. Mater. 6(7), 497–500 (2007).
5. J. Hou, H.-Y. Chen, S. Zhang, R. I. Chen, Y. Yang, Y. Wu, and G. Li, “Synthesis of a Low Band Gap Polymer
and Its Application in Highly Efficient Polymer Solar Cells,” J. Am. Chem. Soc. 131(43), 15586–15587 (2009).
6. D. Thorp, P. Campbell, and S. R. Wenham, “Absorption enhancement in conformally textured thin-film Silicon
solar cells,” in Proceedings of the 25th IEEE Photovoltaic (PV) Specialists Conference (IEEE, Piscataway, NJ,
1996), pp. 705–708.
7. S.-B. Rim, S. Zhao, S. R. Scully, M. D. McGehee, and P. Peumans, “An effective light trapping configuration
for thin-film solar cells,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 91(24), 243501 (2007).
8. K. Tvingstedt, V. Andersson, F. Zhang, and O. Inganas, “Folded reflective tandem polymer solar cell doubles
efficiency,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 91(12), 123514 (2007).
9. V. Andersson, K. Tvingstedt, and O. Inganas, “Optical modeling of a folded organic solar cell,” J. Appl. Phys.
103(9), 094520 (2008).
10. V. Andersson, N.-K. Persson, and O. Inganas, “Comparative study of organic thin film tandem solar cells in
alternative geometries,” J. Appl. Phys. 104(12), 124508 (2008).
11. V. Andersson, U. Wuerfel, and O. Inganas, “Full day modeling of V-shaped organic solar cell,” Sol. Energy
85(6), 1257–1263 (2011).
12. P. Peumans, V. Bulovic, and S. R. Forrest, “Efficient photon harvesting at high optical intensities in ultrathin
organic double-heterostructure photovoltaic diodes,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 76(19), 2650 (2000).
13. J. Y. Kim, S. H. Kim, H. H. Lee, K. Lee, W. Ma, X. Gong, and A. J. Heeger, “New Architecture for High-
Efficiency Polymer Photovoltaic Cells Using Solution-Based Titanium Oxide as an Optical Spacer,” Adv. Mater.
18(5), 572–576 (2006).

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A305
14. L. S. Roman, O. Inganas, T. Granlund, T. Nyberg, M. Svensson, M. R. Andersson, and J. C. Hummelen,
“Trapping Light in Polymer Photodiodes with Soft Embossed Gratings,” Adv. Mater. 12(3), 189–195 (2000).
15. M. Niggemann, M. Glatthaar, A. Gombert, A. Hinsch, and V. Wittwer, “Diffraction gratings and buried nano-
electrodes—architectures for organic solar cells,” Thin Solid Films 451-452, 619–623 (2004).
16. K. Tvingstedt, M. Tormen, L. Businaro, and O. Inganas, “Light confinement in thin film organic photovoltaic
cells,” Proc. SPIE 6197, 61970C, 61970C-10 (2006).
17. M. Niggemann, M. Glatthaar, P. Lewer, C. Muller, J. Wagner, and A. Gombert, “Functional microprism
substrate for organic solar cells,” Thin Solid Films 511-512, 628–633 (2006).
18. K. Forberich, G. Dennler, M. C. Scharber, K. Hingerl, T. Fromherz, and C. J. Brabec, “Performance
improvement of organic solar cells with moth eye anti-reflection coating,” Thin Solid Films 516(20), 7167–7170
(2008).
19. K. Tvingstedt, S. Dal Zilio, O. Inganäs, and M. Tormen, “Trapping light with micro lenses in thin film organic
photovoltaic cells,” Opt. Express 16(26), 21608–21615 (2008).
20. J.-Y. Lee and P. Peumans, “The origin of enhanced optical absorption in solar cells with metal nanoparticles
embedded in the active layer,” Opt. Express 18(10), 10078–10087 (2010).
21. C. Min, J. Li, G. Veronis, J.-Y. Lee, S. Fan, and P. Peumans, “Enhancement of optical absorption in thin-film
organic solar cells through the excitation of plasmonic modes in metallic gratings,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 96(13),
133302 (2010).
22. Z. Yu, A. Raman, and S. Fan, “Fundamental limit of nanophotonic light trapping in solar cells,” Proc. Natl.
Acad. Sci. U.S.A. 107(41), 17491–17496 (2010).
23. M. A. Green, “Enhanced evanescent mode light trapping in organic solar cells and other low index
optoelectronic devices,” Prog. Photovolt. Res. Appl. 19(4), 473–477 (2011).
24. A. Raman, Z. Yu, and S. Fan, “Dielectric nanostructures for broadband light trapping in organic solar cells,”
Opt. Express 19(20), 19015–19026 (2011).
25. D.-H. Ko, J. R. Tumbleston, L. Zhang, S. Williams, J. M. DeSimone, R. Lopez, and E. T. Samulski, “Photonic
Crystal Geometry for Organic Solar Cells,” Nano Lett. 9(7), 2742–2746 (2009).
26. D. Duche, P. Torchio, L. Escoubas, F. Monestier, J.-J. Simon, F. Flory, and G. Mathian, “Improving light
absorption in organic solar cells by plasmonic contribution,” Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 93(8), 1377–1382
(2009).
27. A. P. Kulkarni, K. M. Noone, K. Munechika, S. R. Guyer, and D. S. Ginger, “Plasmon-Enhanced Charge Carrier
Generation in Organic Photovoltaic Films Using Silver Nanoprisms,” Nano Lett. 10(4), 1501–1505 (2010).
28. M.-G. Kang, T. Xu, H. J. Park, X. Luo, and L. J. Guo, “Efficiency Enhancement of Organic Solar Cells Using
Transparent Plasmonic Ag Nanowire Electrodes,” Adv. Mater. 22(39), 4378–4383 (2010).
29. J. Yang, J. You, C.-C. Chen, W.-C. Hsu, H. R. Tan, X. W. Zhang, Z. Hong, and Y. Yang, “Plasmonic Polymer
Tandem Solar Cell,” ACS Nano 5(8), 6210–6217 (2011).
30. I.-K. Ding, J. Zhu, W. Cai, S.-J. Moon, N. Cai, P. Wang, S. M. Zakeeruddin, M. Grätzel, M. L. Brongersma, Y.
Cui, and M. D. McGehee, “Plasmonic Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells,” Adv. Eng. Mater. 1(1), 52–57 (2011).
31. L. A. A. Pettersson, L. S. Roman, and O. Inganas, “Modeling photocurrent action spectra of photovoltaic devices
based on organic thin films,” J. Appl. Phys. 86(1), 487 (1999).
32. G. Dennler, K. Forberich, M. C. Scharber, C. J. Brabec, I. Tomis, K. Hingerl, and T. Fromherz, “Angle
dependence of external and internal quantum efficiencies in bulk-heterojunction organic solar cells,” J. Appl.
Phys. 102(5), 054516 (2007).
33. L. J. A. Koster, V. D. Mihailetchi, R. Ramaker, and P. W. M. Blom, “Light intensity dependence of open-circuit
voltage of polymer:fullerene solar cells,” Appl. Phys. Lett. 86(12), 123509 (2005).

1. Introduction
The efficiency of organic photovoltaic (OPV) cells and particularly bulk heterojunction (BHJ)
polymer solar cells has increased steadily [1, 2] through improvements in control over donor-
acceptor blend phase separation and more recently, through advances in the electronic
properties of the polymer materials [3–5]. By lowering the bandgap and increasing the highest
occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) level, a broader absorption spectrum and increasing
open circuit voltage (VOC) are achieved. Despite the advances mentioned above, the external
quantum efficiency (EQE) in devices optimized for maximum overall power conversion
efficiency (PCE), is limited by the ability of the active layer to completely absorb the incident
light. This is certainly the case in spectral regions where absorption is weak, but even at peak
absorption wavelengths the photon absorption probability is usually <75%. Even with internal
quantum efficiencies (IQEs) >90% (i.e. the processes of exciton diffusion, charge transfer,
charge pair separation and carrier collection, are all very efficient), the external quantum yield
is limited by optical absorption to <70%. One possible strategy that significantly increases the
probability that an incident photon is absorbed is light trapping. Without any changes in the
structure or active materials used in the devices, it can result in a much more efficient device

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A306
since the EQE approaches the IQE. Here, we apply such a light trapping strategy based on a
V-trap [6–11] to an efficient BHJ solar cell and show a significant increase in PCE.
Several photon management schemes for OPV cells have been explored. One approach
has been to apply a conductive optical spacer such as BCP or TiOx to maximize light
absorption in the active layer by engineering an optical interference effect [12, 13]. To
enhance optical absorption further, micro scaled geometric light trapping was tried [14–17],
however, electric shunt and morphology distortion due to the grating limit the advantage.
Other geometric light trapping schemes employing micro-lenses or AR coating [18, 19] were
introduced, for which focusing oblique incident of light and additional cost issue for light
trapping layer should be solved. More recently, wave optics approaches to enhance optical
absorption were suggested [20–24] and some success has been achieved in this area [25–30].
Here, we use a geometric scheme in which incident light enters the device active area
multiple times. In particular, we use the V-shape configuration, which was shown to be
effective to low performing OPV [7–11], however, has been argued whether it functions well
to the optimized OPV as well. Efficient BHJ solar cell based on poly [N-9’–heptadecanyl-2,7-
carbazole-alt-5,5-(4’,7’-di-2-thienyl-2’,1’,3′-benzothiadiazole)] (PCDTBT): [6,6]-phenyl C71
butyric acid methyl ester (PC70BM) blend [1] was chosen and proved that the scheme is
effective even on the already optimized high performance polymer cells.
2. Proposed model and simulation
Figure 1 illustrates the design and operation of the V-shaped light trap for a thin film organic
cell. Figure 1(a) shows how multiple bounces of an incident light ray off the active layer
results in an increase in the optical path length and does an increase in absorption. The flat
(no light trap) configuration results in a single bounce. At an opening angle (2α) of 60° and
30°, 3 and 6 bounces are achieved. Normalized photon absorption as a function of position in
the V-shape and wavelength is shown in Fig. 1(b). Note that incident intensity at each
wavelength is also normalized, so that integrated value over the position of V-shape at each
wavelength is proportional to the value of absorption quantum efficiency. Photon absorption
varies spatially and depends on the position in the V-shape as the ray picture shows that light
is not uniformly distributed over the surface. The absorption is larger in the regions where the
number of bounces is larger. For the case of a 30° of opening angle, for instance, the number
of bounces increase from 2 at edge region to 4 at the middle region and finally becomes 6
near the tip of the V, resulting in three different absorption regions. An opening angle of 30°
leads to the highest concentration of light toward the tip of the V compared to the planar or
opening angle of 60°. Especially, the concentrated absorption near the tip is more pronounced
at the spectral regions, where a planar cell shows weak absorption, due to the multitude of
reflections. This indicates that the V-trap functions more effectively for the wavelengths at
which photons are absorbed weakly and thus the absorption spectrum in the tip is
substantially broadened compared to the spectrum of a planar cell. This also explains the
reason that V-shaped light trap performs well for high performance polymer cells as well.

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A307
 (a)

Substrate

Thin film
2α = 60°
(b) 2α = 30°
400 400 400 1
λ (nm)

500 500 500

600 600 600
700 700 700 0
edge center edge edge tip edge edge tip edge
Normalized distance Normalized distance Normalized distance

(c)

Substrate ground Metal cathode over the

to a desired angle spin coated active layer Attached V-shape OPV

Fig. 1. Geometry of V-shaped geometric light trap for an organic solar cell for specified
folding angles (planar / 60 degrees / 30 degrees) The rays schematically show the benefits of
folding the solar cell structure on the number of bounces incident sunlight makes and thus the
light absorption in the cell. Jsc is defined as the photocurrent generated inside the V-trap
divided by aperature size (0.15 cm2). (b) Photon absorption in the active layer for a specified
folding angle (planar / 60 degrees / 30 degrees) We note that the geometric distance of the cell
(x axis) is normalized to the projected distance (aperature distance) of a V-trap. (c) Fabrication
steps for V-shaped PCDTBT:PC70BM OPV used on the presented experiments.

To predict the merit of the V-shape light trapping configuration on the performance of
PCDTBT:PC70BM cells, the absorption quantum efficiency (AQE, i.e. the probability that an
incident photon is absorbed in the active layer) was modeled. Ray tracing was used for ray
propagation and the transfer matrix method [7, 31] was used to model reflection, transmission
and absorption at each ray bounce. Every passage of light in the V-trap as well as the wave
interference effects in the thin solar films are taken into account in the calculations. For
modeling simplicity, we assumed isotropic optical characteristics and optically flat interfaces
between layers. Reflections within the glass substrate were treated incoherently. Using the
AQE, the EQE was estimated based on reported experimentally measured IQE data for an
80nm thickness of the PCDTBT:PC70BM system, which was experimentally verified to be the
optimal thickness for a planar cell. Integration with the AM1.5G solar spectrum then yields
modeled photocurrent densities.
The modeled AQE and parasitic absorption in the electrode materials are shown in Fig. 2
for V-shape opening angles of 180° (no light trap), 60° and 30° with the 80nm thickness of
active layer. Compared to the no light trap-case, V-shaped configurations exhibit a flattened
AQE. The AQE near λ = 450 nm and λ > 600 nm is substantially increased due to the light
trapping effect. The benefits going from 60° to 30° stems primarily from an extension of the
AQE spectrum to longer wavelengths as the AQE for shorter wavelengths has already

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A308
saturated. This effect is limited because the absorption from the PEDOT:PSS HTL and
cathode metal layers starts to play an important role for spectral region between λ = 650 - 700
nm. In Fig. 3, the modeled photocurrent density (JSC) is shown as a function of the V-shape
opening angle (blue solid line). We note that JSC is calculated as the current produced divided
by the aperture that is illuminated, as defined in Fig. 1(a). Since the device area increases as
the opening angle decreases, the current per unit device area (as measured along the
semiconductor surface) actually decreases, but the current per unit illuminated aperture
(which defines efficiency) increases. The broadening and flattening of the AQE spectrum
results in an increase in the predicted JSC from 11.3mA/cm2 to 14.6mA/cm2. The increase in
JSC between opening angles of 120° and 90° degrees is due to multiple ray bounces. At angles
>120°, a slight increase in JSC is observed due to a slight increase in optical path length [32].
For angles <70°, the number of bounces increases further, resulting in a further increase in
JSC. Saturation of the AQE results in diminishing returns and a saturation of the theoretically
achievable JSC at 2α = 16°. A further decrease in opening angle results in a decreasing JSC due
to the increased parasitic absorption in layers other than the active layer, especially for longer
wavelength. Consequently, the ratio of photon absorption in the active layer at each single
bounce is lowered and this results in decreasing Jsc.

Fig. 2. Absorption quantum efficiency for a specified folding angle. (a) Planar (b) 60 degrees
(c) 30 degrees.

3. Experimental study
Figure 1(c) describes a possible way to practically implement the V-trap for an organic cell. It
shows how planar glass substrates, precoated with indium-tin-oxide (ITO), are beveled at an
angle of β = 90°-α to produce a V-shaped opening angle of 2α. This beveling is crucial such
that the glass substrates can make intimate contact and prevent significant photons loss
through the tip region, at which the enhancement is maximized. On these modified glass
substrates, a 30 nm-thick PEDOT:PSS was spin-coated, followed by a 80 nm-thick
PCDTBT:PC70BM 1:4 blend layer from a 1.9% solution in dichlorobenzene (DCB).
Subsequently, a cathode consisting of a 8 nm-thick Ca layer and 200 nm-thick Ag layer was
vacuum deposited. The cathode area of each cell is 0.075 cm2 and the area between cells is
also coated by the same cathode layers to reflect photons as much as possible. Two substrates
are attached at their beveled edges using an epoxy glue and the cell parameters were
measured under top illumination by 100 mW/cm2 1 sun AM1.5 simulated solar spectrum.
The experimentally measured JSC, shown in Fig. 3 (red square markers), increases from 11
mA/cm2 for the planar case (without the light trap) to 14.2 mA/cm2, for a V-shaped light trap
with an opening angle of 30°, a 29% increase. At an opening angle of 60°, JSC = 13.7
mA/cm2. It is worth noting that an equivalent thickness of a planar cell that could generate a
29% increase in JSC is 430nm. This is based on the assumption that the IQE of thicker planar
cell is same as that of thin film used for V-shaped cell. Based on the short exciton diffusion
length, it is expected that it is advantageous to utilize a thinner cell and capitalize on the V-
grooves to trap light. While the dependence of the experimentally measured JSC agrees with
that predicted using model calculations, the model systematically predicts a higher JSC. This

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A309
discrepancy is due to photon leakage at the gap area between separated cathodes in the
substrate surface and degradation by significant light concentration to the tip regions of V-
trap. Additionally the assumption that the sharp corners of V-shaped cells perform the same
as planar regions need to be verified in scalable designs of the presented cells.

Fig. 3. Short circuit current as a function of a V-folding angle. Blue line indicates theoretical
results and red dots show the experimental result.

VOC (Red dot) and the FF (Blue dot) were measured for devices on both sides of a V-
shaped cell, as shown in Fig. 4(a). The total short circuit current (ISC) for a device active area
of 0.15cm2 is also shown in Fig. 4(a). An average value of Voc is 0.83V and 0.84V for each
side, though a small fluctuation of about 0.01V is observed as a function of opening angles. A
slight decrease in the Voc is observed at a folding angle of 30 degrees due to the reduced light
intensity at the overall surface area of the V-shaped cell as well as an increase of dark current
proportional to the surface area of the V-shaped cell [7, 33]. An average fill factor (FF) of
0.58 over the folding angles measured is obtained at both sides, where one side shows an
almost constant value and the other side shows deviation from 0.01 to 0.02 as the folding
angle changes. Isc increases up to 2.13mA for the V-shaped cell with the folding angle of 30
degrees over 1.65mA for the planar cell.

Fig. 4. (a) Open circuit voltage (Red dot) and Fill factor (blue dot) measured separately at each
side, and total short circuit current (green line) as a function of the folding angle for the V-
shape configuration. (b) Power conversion efficiency as a function of a folding angle of the V-
shape configuration.

By measuring the generated power at both sides, the PCE is calculated from the planar
cell to the V-shaped cell for a specific folding angle, as shown in Fig. 4(b). At an angle of 30

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A310
degrees, an enhanced efficiency of 7.2% is obtained, whereas the planar cell shows an
efficiency of 5.3%. It should be noted that the increased FF compensates for the reduced Voc
for narrower folding angles and thereby slightly contributes to the improvement in the
efficiency.
4. Effect of the oblique incident of light
To evaluate the performance of V-shaped cell under practical solar illumination conditions,
the current generation with respect to the oblique incident of light is theoretically analyzed.
Photocurrent is generated under the illumination of AM 1.5G solar spectrum and θ i is defined
as the angle from the normal axis of projected area of V-shaped cell. A detailed analysis of
full day modeling of OPV is presented in other publication [11] and this paper focuses on the
comparison of planar and V-shaped cell using PCDTBT:PC70BM materials. Although the
oblique incident of light into the V-shape configuration results in decreasing bounces of a ray
for a given folding angle, light absorption of the V-shaped cell is still larger than that of the
planar cell due to reduced Fresnel reflection. Consequently, the V-shaped PCDTBT:PC70BM
cell shows superior performance over the planar cell for all angles of incidence light as shown
in Fig. 5.

Fig. 5. Effect of the incident angle of the illumination (θi) on the short circuit current density
(Jsc). Blue line shows the current generation at 30 degrees of the V-shaped cell and the red line
shows the same for a planar cell.

5. Conclusion
In summary, V-shaped light trap, which has shown to be efficient light trapping for low
performing OPV, also enhances the performance of already optimized thin film polymer solar
cells further by increasing the optical path length of low absorbing spectrum substantially.
Here, both theoretical and experimental improvements were demonstrated by applying the V-
shaped light trapping scheme to a PCDTBT:PC70BM BHJ polymer solar cell. Theoretically,
an increase of the AQE for a weakly absorbing spectral regions of a cell is expected and
experimentally, 29% increase of Jsc under 100mW/cm2 AM1.5G illumination is
demonstrated through the intimate contact at tip region. PCE of 7.2% is attained in the V-
shaped cell with folding angle of 30 degrees, whereas PCE of 5.3% is obtained in the planar
cell. Also, we found that the V-shaped PCDTBT:PC70BM cell is always superior to the planar
cell for all angles of incident light. Furthermore, we anticipate that more practical fabrication
is possible by using a plastic substrate with sharp tip or millimeter scaled prism substrate with
uniform thermal evaporation.

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A311
 Acknowledgments
This publication was based on work supported by the Center for Advanced Molecular
Photovoltaics (CAMP) (Award No KUS-C1-015-21), made by King Abdullah University of
Science and Technology (KAUST). S J. K. and G. M. acknowledges support from the King
Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) Investigator Award (No. KUS-I1-
001-12) and the Global Climate and Energy Project at Stanford (GCEP). S J. K. gratefully
acknowledges support from the Samsung scholarship. S J. K. also thanks Jason Bloking for
assistance with the measurements.

#183806 - $15.00 USD Received 22 Jan 2013; revised 23 Feb 2013; accepted 26 Feb 2013; published 14 Mar 2013
(C) 2013 OSA 6 May 2013 / Vol. 21, No. S3 / OPTICS EXPRESS A312

View publication stats