Space-charge-limited currents for organic solar cells optimisation

Basic suppositions and microphysical origin of the occurrence of the space-charge-limited currents (SCLC) are presented in general and for the temperature-modulated space-charge-limited currents (TM-SCLC) in particular. The criteria are given for the spectroscopical method TM-SCLC to be used for localized electron states elucidation in organic semiconducting materials for organic solar cells optimization and modelling. The “visibility “of the localized states by SCLC method, i.e. the power of the SCLC method to distinguish the localized states, is tested by the modelling, varying the temperature, energy position of localized states and their concentration. Generally, it was determined that the SCLC measurements results are more reliable with the increased energy of the states, with their increased concentration and with decreased temperature. The correlation (or its absence) between the measured current and activation energy on applied voltage, expressed by the dependence of preexponential factor of conductivity on activation energy (Meyer–Neldel rule), gives the possibility to determine the energy range where the reconstruction of density of localized states function is reliable.