Minimizing exciton and charge losses in next generation organic solar cell materials with extremely weak vibronic coupling, a single molecule approach

Research Group: Chemistry
Number of Students: 1
Length of Study in Years: 4 Years
Full-time Project: yes

Funding

Funding is provided via the China Scholarship Council.  

• Available to Chinese applicants only.
• Applicant required to start in September 2024.
• The studentship arrangement will cover overseas tuition fees for the duration of the studentship.

 

Project Description

Organic solar cells, while highly efficient, continue to exhibit voltage losses larger than those of most inorganic solar cells, limiting their power conversion efficiency. One of the primary causes is non-radiative charge and excited state relaxation processes. This project aims to investigate these mechanisms in individual molecules using single-molecule techniques (drawing on Dr. James Thomas's expertise) and compare the findings to bulk laser spectroscopy experiments (drawing on Dr. Dimitrov's expertise). The results are expected to provide unprecedented insights into modern organic solar cell materials. This will primarily be an experimental project, utilising state-of-the-art equipment at QMUL and materials from Dr. Brandt’s group, as well as systems that have garnered significant recent interest: Nature, 629, p. 355 (2024).

Supervisors:

Stoichko Dimitrov will be the main supervisor (Spectroscopy | Dimitrov Lab); Dr James Thomas (Thomas lab) a co-supervisor; Dr Jochen Brandt a co-supervisor (Brandt Lab).

Dimitrov leads the Photophysics and Photochemistry group with world leading laser spectroscopy and materials development expertise at the Department of Chemistry at QMUL (ranked 8^th for Impact and 9^th for research outputs in the UK). Dr Thomas leads a group on single molecule characterisation and transistor devices at the Department of Physics at QMUL. Brandt leads a group working on the interaction of chirality and spin at the Department of Chemistry at QMUL.

 

Relevant publications:

• Dimitrov et al. Generating long-lived triplet excited states in narrow bandgap conjugated polymers Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2023, 145 (6), 3507-3514.
• Dimitrov et al. Polaron pair mediated triplet generation in polymer/fullerene blends Nature communications, 2015, 6 (1), 6501.
• Thomas et al. Phase-coherent charge transport through a porphyrin nanoribbon Journal of the American Chemical Society, 2023, 145 (28), 15265-15274.
• Thomas et al. Connections to the Electrodes Control the Transport Mechanism in Single‐Molecule Transistors Angewandte Chemie International Edition, 2024, 63 (16), e202401323.
• Brandt et al. The added value of small-molecule chirality in technological applications Nature Reviews Chemistry, 2017, 1 (6), 0045

Requirements

Application Method:

To apply for this studentship and for entry on to the Chemistry programme (Full Time) please follow the instructions detailed on the following webpage:

https://www.qmul.ac.uk/spcs/phdresearch/application-process/#apply

Deadline for application - 31st of January 2024

Supervisor Contact Details:

E-mail: s.dimitrov@qmul.ac.uk

SPCS Academics: Dr Stoichko Dimitrov