Abstract

In this study, we aimed to evaluate the evaporating fractions of a polymeric material by thermal evaporation to scale up polymer-based organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices. Due to its high thermal stability and suitable optoelectronic properties, we used a poly(azomethine)-based material (PAZ2ThA2) as the donor layer. The control and reproducibility of our methodology were confirmed through two specific analyses: size exclusion chromatography, which allowed us to separate and measure the size of the deposited material, and UV-visible absorption spectroscopy, which provided information about the light absorption of the evaporated fractions. Our deposition rates reached a maximum of 1.4 & Aring;s(-1). We fabricated bilayer OPV devices to evaluate the thickness dependence of the deposited fractions and achieved a maximum short-circuit current density of 1.60 mAcm(-2) at 9 nm thickness. These results confirm the feasibility of obtaining reproducible vacuum-processed polymer-based OPV devices, a significant step toward their scalability. (c) 2025 Author(s).