Metal-free organic dyes for TiO2 and ZnO dye-sensitized solar cells

Year: 2016

Authors: Selopal GS., Wu HP., Lu JF., Chang YC., Wang MK., Vomiero A., Concina I., Diau EWG.

Autors Affiliation: Univ Brescia, Dept Informat Engn, SENSOR Lab, I-25133 Brescia, Italy; CNR, INO SENSOR Lab, I-25123 Brescia, Italy; Natl Chiao Tung Univ, Dept Appl Chem, Hsinchu 30010, Taiwan; Natl Chiao Tung Univ, Inst Mol Sci, Hsinchu 30010, Taiwan; Huazhong Univ Sci & Technol, Sch Opt & Elect Informat, Wuhan Natl Lab Optoelect, Michael Gratzel Ctr Mesoscop Solar Cells, Wuhan 430074, Peoples R China; Lulea Univ Technol, S-97198 Lulea, Sweden.

Abstract: We report the synthesis and characterization of new metal-free organic dyes (namely B18, BTD-R, and CPTD-R) which designed with D-p-A concept to extending the light absorption region by strong conjugation group of p-linker part and applied as light harvester in dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). We compared the photovoltaic performance of these dyes in two different photoanodes: a standard TiO2 mesoporous photoanode and a ZnO photoanode composed of hierarchically assembled nanostructures. The results demonstrated that B18 dye has better photovoltaic properties compared to other two dyes (BTD-R and CPTD-R) and each dye has higher current density (J(sc)) when applied to hierarchical ZnO nanocrystallites than the standard TiO2 mesoporous film. Transient photocurrent and photovoltage decay measurements (TCD/TVD) were applied to systematically study the charge transport and recombination kinetics in these devices, showing the electron life time (T-R) of B18 dye in ZnO and TiO2 based DSSCs is higher than CPTD-R and BTD-R based DSSCs, which is consistent with the photovoltaic performances. The conversion efficiency in ZnO based DSSCs can be further boosted by 35%, when a compact ZnO blocking layer (BL) is applied to inhibit electron back reaction.

Journal/Review: SCIENTIFIC REPORTS

Volume: 6      Pages from: 18756-1  to: 18756-12

More Information: A.V. acknowledges the European Commission for partial funding under the contract F-Light Marie Curie 299490. The authors acknowledge the European Commissions for partial funding under the contract WIROX 295216. I.C. acknowledges Regione Lombardia under X-Nano Project and National Research Council Project for partial funding. G.S.S. acknowledges OIKOS s.r.l. for funding. A.V. acknowledges Kempestiftelserna and Lulea University of Technology Labfonden program for financial support for equipment.
KeyWords: Intensity-modulated Photovoltage; Zinc-oxide Nanosheet; High-efficiency; Charge-transport; Conversion; Films; Nanocrystallites; Recombination; Electrolytes; Photoanodes
DOI: 10.1038/srep18756

Citations: 64
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