The Future of Flexible Organic Solar Cells

Extensive efforts have been devoted during the last decade to organic solar cell research that has led to remarkable progress and achieved power conversion efficiencies (PCEs) in excess of 10%. Among the existing flexible organic solar cells, ultrathin organic solar cells with a total thickness 10 µm and ultrathin organic solar cells with substrate thickness ≤10 µm. Key technologies for the further improvement of PCE of flexible/ultrathin organic solar cells are discussed. Strategies to improve the stability and some important aspects, which determine the mechanical robustness of flexible organic solar cells, are also presented and discussed. Tremendous efforts have been devoted during the last decade and have achieved remarkable progress in the field of flexible/ultrathin organic solar cells. This essay summarizes how the performance of ultrathin organic solar cells has been developed and discusses future directions of organic solar cells. Improvements in power conversion efficiency and stabilities are summarized, and potential approaches for further improvement are discussed.