Enantiopure vs. Racemic Naphthalimide End-Capped Helicenic Non-Fullerene Electron Acceptors: Impact on Organic Photovoltaics Performance

Pierre Josse (1) , Ludovic Favereau (2) , Chengshuo Shen (2) , Sylvie Dabos-Seignon (1) , Philippe Blanchard (1) , Clement Cabanetos (1) , Jeanne Crassous (2)

1 MOLTECH-Anjou
2 ISCR - Institut des Sciences Chimiques de Rennes

Impact of the enantiopurity on organic photovoltaics (OPV) performance was investigated through the synthesis of racemic and enantiomerically pure naphthalimide end-capped helicenes and their application as non-fullerene molecular electron acceptors in OPV devices. A very strong increase of the device performance was observed by simply switching from the racemic to the enantiopure forms of these π-helical non-fullerene acceptors with power conversion efficiencies jumping from 0.4% to ca 2.0% in air-processed poly(3-hexylthiophene) based devices, thus highlighting the key role of enantiopurity in the photovoltaic properties.

Keywords: helicene; non-fullerene; organic photovoltaics; chirality; enantiopurity

Domains: Chemical Sciences; Organic chemistry; Physics [physics]

Pierre Josse, Ludovic Favereau, Chengshuo Shen, Sylvie Dabos-Seignon, Philippe Blanchard, et al.. Enantiopure vs. Racemic Naphthalimide End-Capped Helicenic Non-Fullerene Electron Acceptors: Impact on Organic Photovoltaics Performance. Chemistry - A European Journal, 2017, 23 (26), pp.6277-6281. ⟨10.1002/chem.201701066⟩. ⟨hal-01497181⟩