Tailoring Donor-Acceptor Pairs of Tungsten-based Transition Metal Di-Chalcogenides (TMDCs) for Improved Photovoltaic Current Generation

As photovoltaic materials approach the Shockley-Queisser limit, unconventional approaches have increased in significance. 2D Transition Metal Di-Chalcogenides (TMDCs) have great potential for use as ultra-thin photovoltaic materials in solar cells because of their uniquely favorable opto-electronic properties, tunable direct bandgaps and significant dipole moments. Dark state protection induced by dipole-dipole interactions forms new bright and dark states in the conduction band that reduce radiative recombination and enhance photon-to-electron conversion, leading to higher photocurrents. In this work, we show current improvements up to 35% by modeling dark state protection in a solar cell composed of Tungsten Diselenide (WSe2) and Tungsten Sulfo-Selenide (WSeS).