Polymers Containing Phenothiazine, Either as a Dopant or as Part of Their Structure, for Dye-Sensitized and Bulk Heterojunction Solar Cells

Abstract

Potential photovoltaic technology includes the newly developed dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) and bulk heterojunction (BHJ) solar cells. Owing to their diverse qualities, polymers can be employed in third-generation photovoltaic cells to specifically alter their device elements and frameworks. Polymers containing phenothiazine, either as a part of their structure or as a dopant, are easy and economical to synthesize, are soluble in common organic solvents, and have the potential to acquire desired electrochemical and photophysical properties by mere tuning of their chemical structures. Such polymers have therefore been used either as photosensitizers in dye-sensitized solar cells, where they have produced power conversion efficiency (PCE) values as high as 5.30%, or as donor or acceptor materials in bulk heterojunction solar cells. Furthermore, they have been employed to prepare liquid-free polymer electrolytes for dye-sensitized and bulk heterojunction solar cells, producing a PCE of 8.5% in the case of DSSCs. This paper reviews and analyzes almost all research works published to date on phenothiazine-based polymers and their uses in dye-sensitized and bulk heterojunction solar cells. The impacts of their structure and molecular weight and the amount when used as a dopant in other polymers on the absorption, photoluminescence, energy levels of frontier orbitals, and, finally, photovoltaic parameters are reviewed. The advantages of phenothiazine polymers for solar cells, the difficulties in their actual implementation and potential remedies are also evaluated.