Hydrothermally tailored anatase TiO 2 nanoplates with exposed {111} facets for highly efficient dye-sensitized solar cells.
11 November 2017
Abstract
TiO2 nanostructures with unique morphology, pseudo-square shaped, non-aggregated and exposed facets are of great interest in several fields including photovoltaic applications. In particular, 1-D TiO2 nanorod or 2-D TiO2 nanosheet based dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) often show promising photovoltaic performance due to their 1-D and 2-D morphologies, respectively.
Therefore, exploring TiO2 with new nanostructure is essential. In this work, we report the synthesis of non-aggregated anatase TiO2 nanoplates with {1 1 1} facets from TiOF2 crystals by two-step hydrothermal process. The prepared TiO2 nanoplates were employed as a supplementary light scattering layer in the photoelectrode, which resulted in 10% improvement in the photovoltaic performance of DSSC in comparison with the photoelectrode without TiO2 scattering layer.
Such improvements were attributed to the enhancement in light scattering due to the pseudo-square shaped 2-D plate-like morphology, higher dye loading, increase in electron lifetime and the decrease in electron recombination, which were examined by photovoltaic characterization, impedance analysis, UV–vis diffuse reflectance and absorbance spectra.
Citation
Karthikeyan V, Maniarasu S, Manjunath V, Ramasamy E, Veerappan G. Hydrothermally tailored anatase TiO 2 nanoplates with exposed {111} facets for highly efficient dye-sensitized solar cells. Solar Energy. 2017 May 1;147:202-8.
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Category: Solar & Photovoltaics