Balance on the charge generation, separation and transfer performance of different TiO2 nanostructures in quantum dot sensitized solar cells

Abstract

TiO2 nanoparticle and nano-array structures including nanorods, nanowires and nanotubes are prepared for the photo-electrodes of CuInS2 quantum dot sensitized solar cells, which are investigated the balance on charge generation, separation and transfer performance in solar cells. The optical absorption properties and PL spectra of different photo-electrodes are investigated, which indicates better charge generation property for nanoparticle structure and better charge separation property for nano-arrays structure. With the grain boundary of nanoparticle films and excellent charge transfer performance of nano-arrays films, higher short-circuit current density value has been performed for all the nano-array structure based solar cells. Due to the relative large surface area of three nano-arrays structure for charge generation, excellent charge separation and transfer performance, the TiO2 nanotube based CuInS2 quantum dot sensitized solar cells exhibits greater photovoltaic efficiency than other nanostructures, which can support the progress for further photovoltaic performance enhancement on quantum dot sensitized solar cells.