Chapter 480: Sprint "Nature" in 3 weeks!

Next, Tian Qing reported on her work.
Recently, based on the effective layer materials of the bottom cell and the top cell in the article "Science" contributed by Xu Qiu, she designed several organic photovoltaic laminate devices under the combination of transport layers, and initially explored the device structure of the laminate device and the interface charge recombination. There is no progress in the relationship between the two.
It is understandable that Tian Qing’s experiment has been slow this time.
Therefore, this experiment involved a new CELIV test method, which she also practiced while learning.
The theoretical research and explanation will be mainly carried out by the Finnish Ronald team.
Xu Qiu has done almost no experiments in the past two weeks, and concentrated on writing articles for two weeks.
The previously missing experimental data, the data from the third-party NIM test, have been obtained by Mo Wenlin to Beijing to send samples. The light source data was measured last Thursday.
Now the data is complete, and the article has been written.
Therefore, on Sunday, two articles were posted one after another.
Among them, one is the Y2 system and voted for AM.
The other is the Y3-Y5 system and voted for EES.
The reason why I chose to vote for EES for this article was simply because Xu Qiu hadn't voted for this journal for a long time, so he simply voted for one.
AM, JACS, EES, and NC are the top publications in the area of ​​materials. Of course, even if they are rain and dew, NC is too expensive.
Moreover, in a strict sense, Xu Qiu does not have an EES article in his hand, but there is an EES that is shared with his school sister, but he is ranked second.
Subsequently, Xu Qiu reported part of their experimental results on behalf of Han Jiaying and Wu Shengnan.
First, the school girl synthesized two donor materials, L2, L6, and S1, and prepared organic photovoltaic cells based on these three donor materials. The device performance basically repeated the results in the literature.
At the same time, Xuemei also modified L2 and L6 materials according to Xu Qiu's instructions, and developed several donor materials including L2-F and L6-Cl.
Objectively speaking, it only took Han Jiaying about two weeks to deliver all these new materials to the liver, and the work efficiency was indeed very high.
The reason is that, on the one hand, with L2 and L6, it is much easier to develop new materials such as L2-F and L6-Cl.
Because the optimized sites are all on the BDT unit, and the fluorine- or chlorine-substituted BDT unit has ready-made materials and does not need to be re-synthesized, so it is equivalent to just another Stille coupling reaction.
On the other hand, Han Jiaying has been specializing in the synthesis of polymer donor materials for a long time, and has a very deep understanding of the success of donor materials. In addition, the application of microwave reactors that can shorten the reaction time, and Xu Xinjie, a little undergraduate assistant. The work efficiency of school girls has been greatly improved.
It used to be a polymerization reaction. It may take a week from the reaction to get the product. Now if the speed is fast, it can be done in two days at the earliest.
The reaction time is 1 hour, the reaction time is 8-12 hours, the Soxhlet extraction with methanol, acetone, and n-hexane is 12 hours, the Soxhlet extraction with chloroform is 12 hours, and the vacuum drying is 3 hours. Other miscellaneous things take 8-12 hours, a total of 48 hours about.
However, although the materials are available, the efficiency data has not yet been completed, only a preliminary result.
Among them, the highest efficiency of the combination of L6-Cl and non-Y series receptor IDIC-4F materials has surpassed the original H4: IDIC-4F system.
The school girl did not have time to combine donor materials such as L6-Cl with Y series acceptors to prepare devices.
Because it is still more troublesome to make devices in reality, it is impossible to directly open up and hung up and explore all systems simultaneously in batches like Xu Qiu did.
Therefore, when researchers imitate others, they usually give priority to trying out systems with similar structures, which is the so-called controlled variable method, which emphasizes a gradual approach.
Otherwise, if there is no reference, whether the final efficiency has risen or fallen, it is hard to explain.
In addition, the postdoctoral sister has basically devoted all her energy to helping Xu Qiu synthesize new series of materials in the past two weeks.
After all, she had similarly "bailed out" two high-end articles from Xu Qiu's side before, and they must be paid back, at the cost of helping with work.
In the end, the postdoctoral sister developed a series of Y series receptor materials including Y11-Y20, etc. There are more than a dozen kinds of them, each with a yield of almost 50-100 mg.
Similar to the younger sisters, the post-doctoral sisters only conducted preliminary device performance explorations.
However, she was shocked by the result.
The performance of the H4: Y18 system with the best performance, the efficiency is actually followed by the performance of the system, and the reason why the efficiency is the best performance is Y18 instead of the Y20 obtained in the Xu Qiu simulation laboratory. It may be mainly because of the postdoctoral sister. Insufficient repetitive experiments and relatively large data fluctuations.
At that time, Wu Shengnan saw the hot data that had just been released, and he secretly thanked him. Fortunately, 14% of his previous system did not greet the "Nature" Dazi magazine, otherwise it is estimated to be buried in his own hands.
Looking at the current situation, the dual single-end system has an efficiency of close to 17%. A big journal of "Nature" must have not run, and there is even a certain chance that it can hit a CNS again.
Wu Shengnan couldn't help feeling that it didn't take long for Xu Qiu's first "Science" to be released, and now there is a new system that can reach the threshold of CNS.
Why can't I think of optimizing like this?
Why is the optimization I think of is "reverse optimization"?
The post-doctoral sister fell into a short-term self-doubt, but she quickly adjusted her mentality.
Because according to her understanding of Xu Qiu, she would definitely not treat herself badly. Youdao is "no credit, but hard work."
Xu Qiu eats meat, she drinks some soup and mixes a few more articles like AM, which is also satisfying.
The articles that I get by my skills are not shabby.
In fact, when Wei Xingsi received Xu Qiu’s experimental ideas before, he knew that Xu Qiu planned to synthesize more than a dozen Y series receptor materials at one time. He was also worried about whether to carry out so many experiments at once. The steps are too big and the eggs are pulled."
After all, no matter how much manpower and material resources are invested in scientific research, once the direction is wrong, the final benefit may be close to zero.
Someone might say, how can it be 0? At least one wrong option was ruled out.
But in fact, there may be tens of thousands of wrong options, and there are only so few correct options.
Even if a wrong option is eliminated, it is still inconspicuous for the total amount, because the denominator is large enough.
However, although Wei Xingsi had doubts at the time, he still firmly supported Xu Qiu.
In any case, Xu Qiu has historical record as the support, so it is worthy of Wei Xingsi to believe unconditionally.
Now, Teacher Wei will see this result in the group. He knows that he had made a wise choice. He couldn't close his legs with a smile, but he cocked Erlang's legs, shaking and shaking.
Wei Xing's thoughts are more far-reaching:
According to the current trend, it is only a preliminary attempt, and the efficiency has been achieved.
If it can be higher, even if it only increases a little, it can reach 17%, and there is a high probability that it will be able to get another CNS-level article.
After all, this is a dual-single-knot system, if it is expected to surpass 17%, it is of great significance.
This shows that the efficiency of pure organic stacked devices can be rushed to a higher level, and even the threshold of 20% may even have a chance to cross!
If it can really increase by 20%, the organic photovoltaic field will usher in a transformation, and its own research team will become the brightest one in the hall of glory.
Because whether it is organic photovoltaics, perovskite photovoltaics, or silicon solar cells, the photoelectric conversion efficiency has a limit.
According to Schottky limit theory, the theoretical value of this efficiency limit is about 30%.
However, the actual efficiency value is generally not as high as the theory, and it is already very close to the extreme value in the early 20%.
For example, the current very hot perovskite photovoltaic devices have efficiencies of about 23% and 24%. It is difficult to achieve one step closer.
This is also the reason why many people turn to two-dimensional perovskites, because the original road has no room for improvement, and their research group can’t stop work, so they can only create new areas and continue research. (Water article) too.
Researchers have worked on silicon-based solar cells for more than 40 years, and now the efficiency is stuck at 26% and 27%.
If organic photovoltaics can reach 20%, the gap with 23% and 26% is actually very small.
After that, if it can solve a series of problems such as the cost and stability of organic photovoltaics, organic photovoltaics may not be able to achieve commercialization, and a part of the cake will be taken away from the current dominant silicon-based solar cells.
Wei Xing thought about the previous dialogue between him and Xu Qiu, including the previous "Science", as if Xu Qiu had foreseen all this early on.
Could it be that this kid can be a prophet?
how can that be possible.
Wei Xingsi quickly moved this idea out of his mind, looked at Xu Qiu, smiled and asked, "What do you plan to do next for this job?"
Xu Qiu responded: "I plan to optimize it myself, and then start writing the article simultaneously."
"Well, what journal do you plan to submit?" Wei Xingsi asked with a smile, he mainly wanted to touch Xu Qiu's bottom to see if Xu Qiu had confidence in his work.
Xu Qiu said casually: "The last article was for "Science", this one is "Nature"."
Hearing Xu Qiu's relaxed tone, Wei Xingsi raised his eyebrows. This is basically there, so he hurriedly said: "Very good! You just use the "Nature" template to write the article first."
Afterwards, Wei Xingsi looked at other people in the research group and said: "The experimental resources in the recent group will be given priority to Xu Qiu, Wu Shengnan, Mo Wenlin, and you will cooperate with Xu Qiu for experiments. Wu Feifei, your perovskite experiments. You can slow down..."
"No problem." Wu Feifei nodded, her heart a little complicated, as expected, "one thing, the first time there will be a second time."
Although the spin-coated glove box is separated from organic and perovskite, there is still only one evaporation glove box. If the organic team still needs to maintain the original speed of a batch of devices a day for experiments, the perovskite team basically needs to do experiments again. Shutdown.
However, Wu Feifei does not have any "dark" ideas, after all, the overall situation is important.
Moreover, although "Nature" and "Science" were not published by Feifei Wu herself, she is still a witness. Xu Qiu is still her junior, Feifei Wu and You Rongyan.
Xu Qiu's report brought the group meeting into a club.
After that, Han Jiaying continued to report.
The various characterization data of the PTQ2 materials of the school girl have been collected, and the data has been sorted out, and the article written, the target journal JACS.
The main highlight of this work is the "non-halogen solvent". After two weeks of optimization, the efficiency of devices processed with tetrahydrofuran THF exceeded 13%. Among the articles using non-halogen solvents, the efficiency is the highest.
Now the organic photovoltaic team led by Xu Qiu has always been the forerunner in the field of organic photovoltaics. The system that comes out casually is the best system in a certain segment, so I want to publish an article in the top issue of the district. The difficulty is not great.
This is also the current status of the scientific research circle. If you want to develop in this circle, whether you follow the right person, choose the right research direction, and whether you are lucky may be tied for important. The importance of personal effort and ability can only be ranked first. Third, the fourth place.
Even if Cao can publish seven "Nature" in a row, if he changes his mentor and research direction, he may still be able to stand out, but he may not be as bright as he is now.
Including many successful people, the reason for success is actually the result of a series of coincidences.
If he loses his memory, returns to the beginning, and walks the path of life again, he may accidentally make a choice mistake, and he won't be where he is now.
In many cases, success cannot be replicated.
For another example, some "excellent youths" may have good luck when they were young and have achieved outstanding results. In the old age, there is not much work that can be done.
This is not necessarily because they are paddling, it may be simply because of bad luck, doing a field cools a field.
No one can do anything about scientific research, an industry that depends on the sky for food.
The two articles AM and JACS of Wu Shengnan's Y1, Y6, and Y7 systems have also been published after supplementing the NIM and light source data.
Mo Wenlin has developed a stacked device based on Y series acceptor materials, using Y4 material to replace the COi8DFIC material used in the top cell, and the bottom cell still uses the IDIC-M system.
In the end, the efficiency of the stacked device reached 15.5%.
Although this value is not as good as the 17.3% reported in the article "Science" submitted by Xu Qiu before, it can be regarded as a certain breakthrough.
Mo Wenlin found that the main problem in this system is the mismatch of current between the top battery and the bottom battery.
If you dig deeper, in essence, the light absorption edge of the Y-series acceptor materials is around 900 nanometers, while the light absorption edge of a theoretically better top cell material should be around 1050 nanometers.
Now it can achieve 15.5%, largely relying on the support of the efficiency of the Y series material itself, coupled with the continuous optimization of the processing technology of the laminated device by the research group.
If you want to further improve the performance of the device, a more appropriate direction for improvement is to synthesize an ultra-narrow band gap Y series acceptor derivative, such as developing an acceptor material with a band gap of about 1.1 eV, so that the light absorption of the material is reduced. Around 1050 nanometers.
However, Xu Qiu does not have time to deal with this matter now.
His first job now is to repeat the results of the L6-Cl:Y20 system in the simulation laboratory.
According to the latest results in the simulation laboratory, the efficiency of the L6-Cl:Y20 system has reached the reality, and there is still a great opportunity to achieve more than 18%.
Several undergraduates attended the group meeting and made some reports, or literature reports, or work summaries.
Although what they said is not of much use to others, it is a rare experience for them.
Xu Qiu's ability to make speeches and reporting at the beginning was actually not very good, but his continuous participation in group meetings over the past two years has also greatly improved his ability to make speeches and reporting.
Fan Wentang has been mainly helping Mo Wenlin to prepare laminated devices recently, and he is already very familiar with the entire device manufacturing process.
At the same time, Xu Qiu can sometimes see Fan Wentang revising his master's thesis and also preparing for his graduation.
After the group meeting, Wei Xingsi called Wu Feifei, Wu Shengnan and Xu Qiu to the Jiangwan Xiancai 513 office.
"Today, we are going to submit the online versions of the two fund projects, and then print them out for review by the department and school." After Wei Xingsi finished speaking, he turned to add:
"Xu Qiu, you can simply check it out for help, and then do the experiment, don't delay you too much time, we can do it here."
"Okay." Xu Qiu nodded. In fact, most of the work on these two fund projects has been completed, only the final delivery work.
The delivery process is similar to Xu Qiu's previous investment in the Sino-Swiss STINT cooperation project, because most of the domestic national funds are issued through the National Natural Science Foundation of China, so the process is similar.
That is to say, you need to fill in a lot of things such as academic achievements, representative works, everyone's resume, etc...
After the online declaration is completed, you need to print out the documents, find the department and school for review and stamp, and finally mail it to the Fund Committee, and wait patiently for the result.
Originally, Xu Qiu planned to talk to Teacher Wei today about graduating ahead of schedule. As a result, looking like this, it is estimated that they will be very busy.
Moreover, Wu Feifei and Wu Shengnan were also present, and they were not easy to speak, so he returned to the laboratory to prepare for the experiment.
The beautiful country MRS meeting started on April 1, and it is now March 7. There are about three weeks before the trip to the beautiful country.
Xu Qiu plans to give this "Nature" article to the liver within three weeks.
Although it sounds unbelievable, three weeks is really short for an article like Nature, but it's actually not impossible.
On the one hand, the organic photovoltaic team is now very strong, and the manpower is very sufficient.
There are nine people in total, Xu Qiu as the team leader, Wu Shengnan with Yin Houlang, mainly for the synthesis of acceptor materials, Han Jiaying with Xu Xinjie, mainly for the synthesis of donor materials, Mo Wenlin with Fan Wentang, mainly for devices preparation.
Finally, there is Tian Qing, who makes up the number, and Chen Wanqing, who "is in Cao Ying's heart in Han", and occasionally can play a role.
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On the other hand, Xu Qiu now knows the result of UU reading www.uukanshu.com, and repeating the process is almost no difficulty, and there is no long trial and error process.
Moreover, the most troublesome synthetic material steps have been completed by Wu Shengnan and Han Jiaying.
At the same time, Xu Qiu also prepared in advance for the light source test. In the test last Thursday, he obtained the light source data of several new materials.
Therefore, Xu Qiu feels that there is still a great opportunity to produce a "Nature" article in three weeks.
Returning to the laboratory, Xu Qiu chose sub-optimal conditions and, with the assistance of Mo Wenlin, prepared a batch of devices including L6-Cl: Y18, L6-Cl: Y20, etc.
His requirements are not high, as long as the efficiency of this batch can be over 17.0%.
Xu Qiu intends to use three batches of devices to increase the efficiency by 18%, each time by about 0.5%, so that it will not appear abrupt and will not delay too much time.