A Non-Fullerene Acceptor with Chlorinated Thienyl Conjugated Side Chains for High-Performance Polymer Solar Cells via Toluene Processing

of main observation and conclusion Small molecular acceptors (SMAs) BTC-2F and BTH-2F, based on heptacyclic benzodi(cyclopentadithiophene) electron-donating core (CBT) with chlorinated-thienyl conjugated and thienyl conjugated side chains, respectively, are designed and synthesized. Compared with non-chlorine acceptor BTH-2F, BTC-2F exhibits slightly blue-shifted absorption spectra, similar the lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) (-3.91 eV), deeper highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) energy level and higher electron mobility than that of BTH-2F. PM6, a wide bandgap polymer, is selected as the donor material to construct bulk heterojunction polymer solar cells processed with nonhalogenated solvent toluene. The optimized PM6:BTC-2F-based device presents a 12.9% power conversion efficiency (PCE), while the PCE of PM6:BTH-2F-based device is only 11.3%. The results suggest that it is an effective strategy to optimize the photoelectric properties of SMAs by incorporating chlorine atom into the conjugated side chains.