Charge-recombination

Liddell P A, Kuciauskas D, Sumida J P, Nash B, Nguyen D, Moore A L, Moore T A and Gust D 1997 Photoinduced charge separation and charge recombination to a triplet state in a carotene-porphyrin-fullerene triad J. Am. Chem. Soc. 119 1400-5... 

Figure 1-3. In Ihis improved bilaycr device structure lor a polymer LED an extra ECHB layer has been inserted between the PPV and the cathode metal. The EC11B material enhances the How of electrons but resists oxidation. Electrons and holes then accumulate near the PPV/EC1113 layer interface. Charge recombination and photon generation occurs in the PPV layer and away from the cathode.

The theory of charge recombination in organic LEDs has been elaborated recently [110-113]. 

Biisslcr et ai [110-113] treated charge recombination in organic LEDs in terms of chemical kinetics. The probability of recombination depends on the ratio of recombination rate ynp-np (where y represents a bimolecular rate constant) and the transition time (itr=dlpE) of the charge carriers through the device. 

Although the electrostatic field on the polyelectrolyte surface effectively impedes back ET, it is unable to retard very fast back ET or charge recombination of the primary ion pair within the photochemical cage. The overall quantum yield of photoinduced ET is actually controlled in most cases by the charge recombination. Hence, its retardation is the key problem for attaining high quantum yields in the photoinduced ET. 

Another important factor to determine the charge separation efficiency is the distance between and the mutual orientation of the donor and the acceptor in the geminate ion-pair state. The rate of charge recombination depends on whether... 

Although the electrostatic potential on the surface of the polyelectrolyte effectively prevents the diffusional back electron transfer, it is unable to retard the very fast charge recombination of a geminate ion pair formed in the primary process within the photochemical cage. Compartmentalization of a photoactive chromophore in the microphase structure of the amphiphilic polyelectrolyte provides a separated donor-acceptor system, in which the charge recombination is effectively suppressed. Thus, with a compartmentalized system, it is possible to achieve efficient charge separation. 

This means that the PMC signal will, apart from the generation rate of minority carriers and a proportionality constant, be determined by the interfacial charge transfer rate constant kr and the interfacial charge recombination rate sr... 

There is an additional simple relation between the surface concentration Aps of photogenerated minority carriers and the charge recombination and charge transfer rates sr and kr to be considered ... 

Figure 16 shows such PMC peaks in the depletion region for electrodes of Si,9 WSez8 and ZnO.12 They all appear near the onset of anodic photocurrents. They have different shapes, which, however, can easily be explained with the assumption of potential-dependent interfacial charge-transfer and charge recombination rates. 

Fig. 5.18 Suppression of charge recombination in coupled Sn02/CdSe system. The photogenerated electrons in CdSe quickly migrate to the lower lying conduction band of SnOa. As a result, they escape recombination with photogenerated holes in CdSe and are collected in greater number at the back contact OTE producing a larger photocurrent. (Reproduced from [333])...

Kruger J, Bach U, Plass R, Cevey L, PiccireUi M, Gratzel M (2001) High efficiency solid-state photovoltaic device due to inhibition of interface charge recombination. Appl Phys Lett 79 2085-2087... 

Recently, photochemical and photoelectrochemical properties of fullerene (Cto) have been widely studied [60]. Photoinduced electron-transfer reactions of donor-Qo linked molecules have also been reported [61-63]. In a series of donor-Cfio linked systems, some of the compounds show novel properties, which accelerate photoinduced charge separation and decelerate charge recombination [61, 62]. These properties have been explained by the remarkably small reorganization energy in their electron-transfer reactions. The porphyrin-Qo linked compounds, where the porphyrin moieties act as both donors and sensitizers, have been extensively studied [61, 62]. 

Strand cleavage studies have provided relative rate constants for hole transport versus the rate constant for the initial chemical event leading to strand cleavage [18-20]. However, they do not provide absolute rate constants for hole transport processes. Several years ago we introduced a method based on femtosecond time-resolved transient-absorption spectroscopy for investigating the dynamics of charge separation and charge recombination in synthetic DNA hairpins [21, 22]. Recently, we have found that extensions of this method into the nanosecond and microsecond time domains permit investigation of the dynamics of hole transport from a primary hole... 

The dynamics of photoinduced charge separation, kcs, and charge recombination, kcr (Fig. 2a), have been studied in several families of hairpins containing an Sa linker and a single G C base pair by means of femtosecond time-resolved transient absorption spectroscopy [27, 28]. Both the singlet state and anion radical of Sa have strong transient absorption centered at 575 nm. The difference in the independently determined band shapes for Sa ... 

Fig. 2 a Energetics of photo oxidation of G and A by singlet Sa. b Dynamics of charge separation (kcs) and charge recombination (kCY) for Sa-linked hairpins possessing a single guanine... 

Fig. 4 Free energy dependence of the rate constants for charge separation and charge recombination for hairpins in which two A T base pairs separate the linker acceptor from the nucleobase donor. The dashed line is a fit of the charge separation data to the Marcus-Levitch-Jortner equation...

Fig. 5 Dynamics of charge separation and charge recombination for hairpins possessing G, Z, GG, and GGG donors...

Whereas other experimental methods have been used to obtain values of kti no other method provides values of k-t or equilibrium data. There are, however, several important limitations of our method. First, the method is restricted to relatively fast hole transport processes that can compete with charge recombination of the Sa -G+ radical ion pair (Fig. 6). This precludes the use of strong acceptors which can oxidize A as well as G (Fig. 2a). We find that hole transport cannot compete with charge recombination in such systems, even when a charge gradient is constructed which should favor hole transport [35]. Second, the method is unable to resolve the dynamics of systems in which return hole transport, k t, is very slow (<104 s-1) or systems in which multiple hole transport processes occur. Third, since the guanine cation radical cannot be detected by transient spectroscopy, the method is dependent upon the analysis of the behavior of Sa-. In section 3.4 we de-... 

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