Dark and noise current generation in organic photodetectors – fundamentals and solutions (DANCE)

• Applicant: Professor Dr. Karl Leo
• Subject Area: Experimental Condensed Matter Physics
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 519620599

Sensor technology drives innovation in many fields such as quality monitoring in food products, blood-oxygen measurement in lightweight conformal wristbands, or data-driven automated industrial production. Organic photodetectors (OPDs) offer many advantages over devices based on conventional semiconductors often containing rare, expensive, or even toxic materials. However, OPDs must be significantly improved to leverage the potential of this new technology. A key performance parameter is high specific detectivity, which requires low noise and high photoresponse. Recently, we have investigated the sources of noise current in OPDs and showed that intra-gap states lead to high noise currents due to thermally generated dark currents. The key goal of this project is to understand how traps are formed in organic donor-acceptor heterojunctions, with the goal to support significant detector performance improvements. The contributions from the projects will also provide important insight for further optoelectronic devices such as organic solar cells.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigator: Dr. Johannes Benduhn