Co-sensitization of organic dyes for efficient dye-sensitized solar cells

• Novel cyanine dyes, in which a tetrahydroquinoline derivative is used as an electron donor and 1-butyl-5-carboxy-3, 3-dimethyl-indol-1-ium moiety is used as an electron acceptor and anchoring group, were designed and synthesized for application in dye-sensitized solar cells. The photovoltaic performance of these solar cells depends markedly on the molecular structure of the dyes in terms of the n-hexyl chains and the methoxyl unit. Retardation of charge recombination caused by the introduction of n-hexyl chains resulted in an increase in electron lifetime. As a consequence, an improvement of open-circuit photovoltage (V oc) was achieved. Also, the electron injection efficiencies were improved by the introduction of methoxyl moiety, which led to a higher short-circuit photocurrent density (Jsc). The highest average efficiency of the sensitized devices (η) was 5.6 % (Jsc=13.3 mA cm-2, Voc=606 mV, and fill factor FF=69.1 %) under 100 mW cm-2 (AM 1.5G) solar irradiation. All of these dyes have very high absorption extinction coefficients and strong absorption in a relatively narrow spectrum range (500-650 nm), so one of our organic dyes was explored as a sensitizer in co-sensitized solar cells in combination with the other two other existing organic dyes. Interestingly, a considerably improved photovoltaic performance of 8.2 % (Jsc=20.1 mA cm-2, Voc=597 mV, and FF=68.3 %) was achieved and the device showed a panchromatic response with a high incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency exceeding 85 % in the range of 400-700 nm. Sensitive dyes absorb it all: Co-sensitization of three spectrally complementary dyes on a TiO2 film in a well-designed sequence significantly improves the photovoltaic performance of the device, and an efficiency of 8.2 % is achieved. The devices demonstrate a panchromatic response with an incident photon-to-current conversion efficiency >80 % over the entire visible spectral region from 400 to 700 nm.

Subject headings

NATURVETENSKAP  -- Kemi (hsv//swe)

NATURAL SCIENCES  -- Chemical Sciences (hsv//eng)

Keyword

cyanines

dyes/pigments

sensitizers

solar cells

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)