Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains

Miller, Evan D.; Jones, Matthew L.; Jankowski, Eric

doi:10.3390/polym10121358

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Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains

Evan D. Miller

Matthew L. Jones

and

Eric Jankowski

Micron School of Materials Science and Engineering, Boise State University, Boise, ID 83705, USA

Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.

Polymers 2018, 10(12), 1358; https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10121358

Received: 15 November 2018 / Revised: 5 December 2018 / Accepted: 5 December 2018 / Published: 7 December 2018

(This article belongs to the Special Issue Multiscale Modeling of Polymers)

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Abstract

Evaluating new, promising organic molecules to make next-generation organic optoelectronic devices necessitates the evaluation of charge carrier transport performance through the semi-conducting medium. In this work, we utilize quantum chemical calculations (QCC) and kinetic Monte Carlo (KMC) simulations to predict the zero-field hole mobilities of ∼100 morphologies of the benchmark polymer poly(3-hexylthiophene), with varying simulation volume, structural order, and chain-length polydispersity. Morphologies with monodisperse chains were generated previously using an optimized molecular dynamics force-field and represent a spectrum of nanostructured order. We discover that a combined consideration of backbone clustering and system-wide disorder arising from side-chain conformations are correlated with hole mobility. Furthermore, we show that strongly interconnected thiophene backbones are required for efficient charge transport. This definitively shows the role “tie-chains” play in enabling mobile charges in P3HT. By marrying QCC and KMC over multiple length- and time-scales, we demonstrate that it is now possible to routinely probe the relationship between molecular nanostructure and device performance. View Full-Text

Keywords: organic photovoltaics; charge transport; semi-empirical; kinetic Monte Carlo

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Miller, E.D.; Jones, M.L.; Jankowski, E. Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains. Polymers 2018, 10, 1358. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10121358

AMA Style

Miller ED, Jones ML, Jankowski E. Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains. Polymers. 2018; 10(12):1358. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10121358

Chicago/Turabian Style

Miller, Evan D., Matthew L. Jones, and Eric Jankowski. 2018. "Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains" Polymers 10, no. 12: 1358. https://doi.org/10.3390/polym10121358

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Tying Together Multiscale Calculations for Charge Transport in P3HT: Structural Descriptors, Morphology, and Tie-Chains

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