Hybrid Organic-Inorganic Solar Cells: Recent Developments and Outlook

Solution processed photovoltaic devices are an attractive alternative to costly inorganic semiconductor based conventional photovoltaics. Solution processable organic photovoltaic systems are affected by low carrier mobility, lifetime issues under ambient conditions and limited optical absorption due to the high bandgaps of organic materials. Nanostructured inorganic materials promise to alleviate some of these drawbacks, by enabling the hybrid systems to perform better in a commercial perspective. This review examines four key areas of hybrid organic-inorganic photovoltaic systems. These are metal oxide-organic, carbon nanotube-organic, semiconductor nanowire-organic and semiconductor nanocrystal-organic systems, which are showing growing importance and potential in the literature. Recent advances in terms of device performance for these respective topics are reviewed, along with an outlook for each hybrid system.