@article{OdziomekGiustoKossmannetal.2022,
  author    = {Odziomek, Mateusz and Giusto, Paolo and Kossmann, Janina and Tarakina, Nadezda and Heske, Julian and Rivadeneira, Salvador M. and Keil, Waldemar and Schmidt, Claudia and Mazzanti, Stefano and Savateev, Oleksandr and Perdigon-Toro, Lorena and Neher, Dieter and K{\"u}hne, Thomas D. and Antonietti, Markus and Lopez-Salas, Nieves},
  title     = {"Red Carbon": a rediscovered covalent crystalline semiconductor},
  series = {Advanced materials},
  volume    = {34},
  journal   = {Advanced materials},
  number    = {40},
  publisher = {Wiley-VCH},
  address   = {Weinheim},
  issn      = {0935-9648},
  doi       = {10.1002/adma.202206405},
  pages     = {13},
  year      = {2022},
  abstract  = {Carbon suboxide (C3O2) is a unique molecule able to polymerize spontaneously into highly conjugated light-absorbing structures at temperatures as low as 0 degrees C. Despite obvious advantages, little is known about the nature and the functional properties of this carbonaceous material. In this work, the aim is to bring "red carbon," a forgotten polymeric semiconductor, back to the community's attention. A solution polymerization process is adapted to simplify the synthesis and control the structure. This allows one to obtain this crystalline covalent material at low temperatures. Both spectroscopic and elemental analyses support the chemical structure represented as conjugated ladder polypyrone ribbons. Density functional theory calculations suggest a crystalline structure of AB stacks of polypyrone ribbons and identify the material as a direct bandgap semiconductor with a medium bandgap that is further confirmed by optical analysis. The material shows promising photocatalytic performance using blue light. Moreover, the simple condensation-aromatization route described here allows the straightforward fabrication of conjugated ladder polymers and can be inspiring for the synthesis of carbonaceous materials at low temperatures in general.},
  language  = {en}
}
@article{NeusserSunTanetal.2022,
  author    = {Neusser, David and Sun, Bowen and Tan, Wen Liang and Thomsen, Lars and Schultz, Thorsten and Perdigon-Toro, Lorena and Koch, Norbert and Shoaee, Safa and McNeill, Christopher R. and Neher, Dieter and Ludwigs, Sabine},
  title     = {Spectroelectrochemically determined energy levels of PM6:Y6 blends and their relevance to solar cell performance},
  series = {Journal of materials chemistry : C, Materials for optical and electronic devices},
  volume    = {10},
  journal   = {Journal of materials chemistry : C, Materials for optical and electronic devices},
  number    = {32},
  publisher = {Royal Society of Chemistry},
  address   = {Cambridge},
  issn      = {2050-7526},
  doi       = {10.1039/d2tc01918c},
  pages     = {11565 -- 11578},
  year      = {2022},
  abstract  = {Recent advances in organic solar cell performance have been mainly driven forward by combining high-performance p-type donor-acceptor copolymers (e.g.PM6) and non-fullerene small molecule acceptors (e.g.Y6) as bulk-heterojunction layers. A general observation in such devices is that the device performance, e.g., the open-circuit voltage, is strongly dependent on the processing solvent. While the morphology is a typically named key parameter, the energetics of donor-acceptor blends are equally important, but less straightforward to access in the active multicomponent layer. Here, we propose to use spectral onsets during electrochemical cycling in a systematic spectroelectrochemical study of blend films to access the redox behavior and the frontier orbital energy levels of the individual compounds. Our study reveals that the highest occupied molecular orbital offset (Delta E-HOMO) in PM6:Y6 blends is similar to 0.3 eV, which is comparable to the binding energy of Y6 excitons and therefore implies a nearly zero driving force for the dissociation of Y6 excitons. Switching the PM6 orientation in the blend films from face-on to edge-on in bulk has only a minor influence on the positions of the energy levels, but shows significant differences in the open circuit voltage of the device. We explain this phenomenon by the different interfacial molecular orientations, which are known to affect the non-radiative decay rate of the charge-transfer state. We compare our results to ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy data, which shows distinct differences in the HOMO offsets in the PM6:Y6 blend compared to neat films. This highlights the necessity to measure the energy levels of the individual compounds in device-relevant blend films.},
  language  = {en}
}