The addition of a third component to a binary bulk heterojunction configuration in organic solar cells is called ternary organic solar cells (TOSCs), which is trending as a solar cell configuration that strikes balance between tandem and binary bulk heterojunction organic solar cells by increasing spectral absorption without laborious processing methods. Apart from increasing the spectral range, the third component is also able to tune the morphology and electronic properties for enhanced performance. Existing reviews on TOSCs thus far mainly focus on reporting related research progresses and their respective performances. Instead, a thorough review on understanding the influence of the third component in terms of morphology and electronic properties via a computational chemistry perspective (structure–morphology–performance) is presented here. This bottom-up approach reviews the influence of the third component originating from intermolecular interactions to crystallization and phase properties, and finally to electronic properties such as charge transfer and energy transfer. Herein, new theoretical insights opening up potential research opportunities to propel organic solar cells to one day surpass 20% power conversion efficiency are revealed.

中文翻译：

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揭开三元有机太阳能电池之谜：第三组分对结构-形态-性能关系影响的综述

在有机太阳能电池的二元本体异质结配置中添加第三种成分称为三元有机太阳能电池 (TOSC)，其趋势是通过增加光谱吸收在串联和二元本体异质结有机太阳能电池之间取得平衡的太阳能电池配置无需费力的处理方法。除了增加光谱范围外，第三个组件还能够调整形态和电子特性以提高性能。迄今为止，对 TOSC 的现有评论主要集中在报告相关研究进展及其各自的表现上。相反，这里提出了通过计算化学的角度（结构-形态-性能）来理解第三组分在形态和电子特性方面的影响的全面回顾。这种自下而上的方法回顾了源自分子间相互作用的第三种成分对结晶和相特性的影响，最后对电荷转移和能量转移等电子特性的影响。在此，揭示了新的理论见解，为推动有机太阳能电池的功率转换效率有朝一日超过 20% 开辟了潜在的研究机会。