The effect of hydrophobic absorbent for reducing charge recombination to improve dye-sensitized solar cell performance

C. Sae-Kung; E. Hatha; P. Sichanugrist; N. Pungwiwut; S. Laosooksathit

doi:10.1117/12.733551

12 November 2007 The effect of hydrophobic absorbent for reducing charge recombination to improve dye-sensitized solar cell performance

C. Sae-Kung, E. Hatha, P. Sichanugrist, N. Pungwiwut, S. Laosooksathit

Author Affiliations +

Proceedings Volume 6656, Organic Photovoltaics VIII; 665617 (2007) https://doi.org/10.1117/12.733551
Event: Photonic Devices + Applications, 2007, San Diego, California, United States

Abstract

Normally, it has been widely acceptable that dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC) plays important roles compared to the conventional solar cells such as monocrystalline, polycrystalline, and even amorphous silicon in accordance with its low manufacturing and fabrication cost. However, the DSSC consists of many interfaces between anode and cathode such as semiconductor to dye and dye to electrolyte and electrolyte to platinum catalyst at the cathode. Therefore, the effect of charge recombination at dye-electrolyte interface is a major role to cell efficiency. One of major implementations to alleviate the recombination effect could be efficiently solved by adding hydrophobic co-adsorbent to dye solution. The co-absorbent molecule will be anchored to titanium dioxide semiconductor like dye and can be the barrier to protect the interface of the triiodide, dye and mesoporous titanium dioxide (TiO₂). In our works, we investigate on various hydrophobic co-adsorbent such as 1-adamantane acetic acid, cholic acid and chenodeoxy cholic acid. The amounts of the co-absorbent were varied as well as the amount of dye N719. It was found that the cholic and chenodeoxy cholic acid increase photovoltage and photocurrent, especially when the concentration was increased. This may be due to shift of conduction band (CB) to negative direction by the co-absorbent but 1-adamantane-acetic acid could not resist charge recombination. In addition multilayer of titanium dioxide was also studied on the effect of conversion efficiency. The maximum 4 layers of TiO₂ provided the best cell performance of 8.3 efficiency with the presence of cholic acid.

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C. Sae-Kung, E. Hatha, P. Sichanugrist, N. Pungwiwut, and S. Laosooksathit "The effect of hydrophobic absorbent for reducing charge recombination to improve dye-sensitized solar cell performance", Proc. SPIE 6656, Organic Photovoltaics VIII, 665617 (12 November 2007); https://doi.org/10.1117/12.733551

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