Influence of space arrangement of silver nanoparticles in organic photoelectric conversion devices

We theoretically and experimentally revealed that silver nanoparticles (AgPs) in organic photoelectric conversion (OPC) devices played definitely different roles depending on the space arrangement of AgPs across the cross-section of the devices. When AgPs are placed in the photoactive layer, near-field effects based on localized surface plasmon resonance of AgPs enhance short-circuit photocurrent resulting to an improvement in the conversion efficiency. On the other hand, when AgPs are placed in the electron transport layer, the conversion efficiency of OPC devices are improved due to an increment of fill factor as well as the open-circuit voltage, caused by the reduction in the cell resistance rather than the plasmonic absorption effect from the AgPs.