Characterizing the Polymer:Fullerene Intermolecular Interactions

Polymer:fullerene solar cells depend heavily on the electronic coupling of the polymer and fullerene molecular species from which they are composed. The intermolecular interaction between the polymer and fullerene tends to be strong in efficient photovoltaic systems, as evidenced by efficient charge transfer processes and by large changes in the energetics of the polymer and fullerene when they are molecularly mixed. Despite the clear presence of these strong intermolecular interactions between the polymer and fullerene, there is not a consensus on the nature of these interactions. In this work, we use a combination of Raman spectroscopy, charge transfer state absorption, and density functional theory calculations to show that the intermolecular interactions do not appear to be caused by ground state charge transfer between the polymer and fullerene. We conclude that these intermolecular interactions are primarily van der Waals in nature.