Organic solar cells with carbon nanotubes replacing In2O3: Sn as the transparent electrode

We report two viable organic excitonic solar cell structures where the conventional ln(2)O(3): Sri (ITO) hole-collecting electrode was, replaced by a thin single-walled carbon nanotube layer. The first structure includes poly(3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene) (PEDOT) and gave a nonoptimized device efficiency of 1.5%. The second did not use PEDOT as a hole selective contact and had an efficiency of 0.47%. The strong rectifying behavior of the device shows that nanotubes are selective for holes and are not efficient recombination sites. The reported excitonic solar cell, produced without ITO and PEDOT, is an important step towards a fully printable solar cell. (c) 2006 American Institute of Physics.