Molecular Doping of PCPDT-BT Copolymers: Comparison of Molecular Complexes with and Without Integer Charge Transfer

Molecular doping in conjugated polymers is a crucial process for their application in organic photovoltaics and optoelectronics. In the present work we theoretically investigate p-type molecu- lar doping in a series of (poly[2,6-(4,4-bis(2-ethylhexyl)-4H-cyclopenta[2,1-b;3,4-b”]dithiophene)-alt- 4,7-(2,1,3-benzothiadiazole)] (PCPDT-BT) conjugated oligomers with different lengths and three widely-used dopants with different electron affinities, namely F4TCNQ, F6TCNNQ, and CN6-CP. We study in detail the molecular geometry of possible oligomer-dopant complexes and its influence on the doping mechanisms and electronic system properties. We find that the mechanisms of dop- ing and charge transfer observed sensitively depend on the specific geometry of the oligomer-dopant complexes. For a given complex different geometries may exist, some of which show transfer of an entire electron from the oligomer chain onto the dopant molecule resulting in an integer-charge transfer complex, leaving the system in a ground state with broken spin symmetry. In other ge- ometries merely hybridization of oligomer and dopant frontier orbitals occurs with partial charge transfer but spin-symmetric ground state. Considering the resulting electronic density of states both cases may well contribute to an increased electrical conductivity of corresponding film samples while the underlying physical mechanisms are entirely different.