Solution-Processable Silicon Phthalocyanines in Electroluminescent and Photovoltaic Devices

Phthalocyanines and their main group
and metal complexes are important classes of organic semiconductor
materials but are usually highly insoluble and so frequently need
to be processed by vacuum deposition in devices. We report two highly
soluble silicon phthalocyanine (SiPc) diester compounds and demonstrate
their potential as organic semiconductor materials. Near-infrared
(λEL = 698–709 nm) solution-processed organic
light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) were fabricated and exhibited external
quantum efficiencies (EQEs) of up to 1.4%. Binary bulk heterojunction
solar cells employing P3HT or PTB7 as the donor and the SiPc as the
acceptor provided power conversion efficiencies (PCE) of up to 2.7%
under simulated solar illumination. Our results show that soluble
SiPcs are promising materials for organic electronics.