2D-FDTD analysis of light propagation in nanostructured organic solar cells

Nanostructured organic solar cells join the advantages of bilayer devices and bulk heterojunction cells. They provide a wide interface area between the active materials and a direct path for carriers´ collection. Furthermore, this architecture can also be advantageous in terms of light absorption. By means of FDTD simulations, we investigate light propagation (absorption and reflection) in nanostructured organic solar cells. We simulate 40 nm-thick devices with poly(3-hexylthiophene) (P3HT) as the electron donor and 1-(3-methoxycarbonyl)-propyl-1-phenyl-(6,6)C₆₁ (PCBM) as the electron acceptor. By varying nanostructuring geometry we obtain different cells which are then compared against a simple bilayer one.