Impacts of side chain and excess energy on the charge photogeneration dynamics of low-bandgap copolymer-fullerene blends

Primary charge photogeneration dynamics in neat and fullerene-blended films of a pair of alternating benzo[1,2-b:4,5-b'] dithiophene (BDT) and thieno[3,4-b] thiophene (TT) copolymers are comparatively studied by using near-infrared, time-resolved absorption (TA) spectroscopy under low excitation photon fluence. PBDTTT-E and PBDTTT-C, differed merely in the respective TT-substituents of ester (-E) and carbonyl (-C), show distinctly different charge photogeneration dynamics. The pair of neat PBDTTT films show exciton lifetimes of similar to 0.1 ns and fluorescence quantum yields below 0.2%, as well as prominent excess-energy enhanced exciton dissociation. In addition, PBDTTT-C gives rise to > 50% higher P center dot+ yield than PBDTTT-E does irrespective to the excitation photon energy. Both PBDTTT-E: PC61BM and PBDTTT-C: PC61BM blends show subpicosecond exciton lifetimes and nearly unitary fluorescence quenching efficiency and, with respect to the former blend, the latter one shows substantially higher branching ratio of charge separated (CS) state over interfacial charge transfer (ICT) state, and hence more efficient exciton-to-CS conversion. For PBDTTTC: PC61BM, the ultrafast charge dynamics clearly show the processes of ICT-CS interconversion and P center dot+ migration, which are possibly influenced by the ICT excess energy. However, such processes are relatively indistinctive in the case of PBDTTT-E: PC61BM. The results strongly prove the importance of ICT dissociation in yielding free charges, and are discussed in terms of the film morphology and the precursory solution-phase macromolecular conformation. (C) 2014 AIP Publishing LLC.