The Synthesis Of Solar Cell Dyes

Author : Hung-Tat Chan
Publisher : Open Dissertation Press
ISBN 13 : 9781361309025
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (9 download)

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Download or read book Synthesis of Photosensitizing Molecules and Fabrication of Inorganic Nanostructures for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell written by Hung-Tat Chan and published by Open Dissertation Press. This book was released on 2017-01-26 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This dissertation, "Synthesis of Photosensitizing Molecules and Fabrication of Inorganic Nanostructures for Dye-sensitized Solar Cell" by Hung-tat, Chan, 陳鴻達, was obtained from The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) and is being sold pursuant to Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License. The content of this dissertation has not been altered in any way. We have altered the formatting in order to facilitate the ease of printing and reading of the dissertation. All rights not granted by the above license are retained by the author. Abstract: Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) have drawn much attention due to their higher versatility and lower production cost compared to inorganic photovoltaics. The top performers of DSSC have achieved power conversion efficiency over 10%, which is comparable to amorphous silicon solar cells. In this work, new photosensitizers and nanostructure for improving the photovoltaic performance of DSSC were developed and evaluated. Two series of cyclometalated ruthenium(II) complex photosensitizer were presented and their photosensitizing properties in DSSC were studied. Eight cyclometalated ruthenium(II) terpyridine complexes with three carboxylic acid groups on the terpyridine ligand were synthesized. Series A (M1 to M4) consist of C, N, N' ligands substituted with phenyl group whereas series B (M5 to M8) consist of C, N, N' ligands substituted with m-fluorophenyl group. All of the complexes exhibited broad aborption spectra covering the whole visible spectrum. The complexes in series B generally showed better photovoltaic performance than those in series A in the DSSCs. DSSC fabricated from M7 achieved the highest Voc, Jsc and power conversion efficiency among other DSSC, which were 0.56 V, 7.30 mAcm-2 and 2.63 % respectively. Truxene-core donor--acceptor dyes were presented and their photosensitizing properties in DSSC were studied. Eight dyes with either one donor two acceptors system (T2, B2, T2R and B2R) or two donor one acceptor system (T1, B1, T1R and B1R) were synthesized. Dyes with two acceptors have high molar extinction coefficients originated from the charge-transfer transition band, which are almost two times higher than those with only one accceptors. Both the enhanced absorption and better anchoring geometry on TiO2 contribute to the better photovoltaic performance of the two acceptors dyes in the DSSCs. Devices fabricated from B2 and volatile solvent electrolyte exhibited the best photovoltaic performance among the truxene-core dyes. The Voc, Jsc, FF and power conversion efficiency of the device were 0.59 V, 9.69 mAcm-2, 0.63 and 3.62 % respectively. Dyes based on cyanoacrylic acid anchoring groups (T1, T2, B1 and B2) were found to perform better than those based on rhodanine-3-acetic acid dyes (T1R, T2R, B1R and B2R) in both donor--acceptor configurations. ITO nanorod/TiO2 nanoparticle composite films with the three different types of ITO nanorod with different length (150 nm, 600 nm and 1.5 μm) were fabricated on FTO glass substrate. The transmittance and sheet resistance of the ITO nanorod array on the FTO glass substrate were found decreased with increasing the length of the ITO nanorod. When the ITO nanorod/TiO2 nanoparticle composite films were applied as the anode in DSSCs, the device fabricated from 600 nm ITO nanorod with TiO2 'double layer' film showed enhanced photocurrent generation. The improved photocurrent generation is suggested to be due to an improved charge collection efficiency at the ITO nanorod back electrode. DOI: 10.5353/th_b4784934 Subjects: Nanostructured materials - Synthesis Dye-sensitized solar cells