Abstract
Recently, semiconductor quantum dot (QD) sensitized solar cells (QDSSCs) are expected to achieve higher conversion efficiency because of the large light absorption coefficient and multiple exciton generation in QDs. The morphology of TiO2 electrode is one of the most important factors in QDSSCs. Inverse opal (IO) TiO2 electrode, which has periodic mesoporous structure, is useful for QDSSCs because of better penetration of electrolyte than conventional nanoparticulate TiO2 electrode. In addition, the ordered three dimensional structure of IO-TiO2 would be better for electron transport. We have found that open circuit voltage Voc of QDSSCs with IO-TiO2 electrodes was much higher (0.2 V) than that with nanoparticulate TiO2 electrodes. But short circuit current density Jsc was lower in the case of IO-TiO2 electrodes because of the smaller surface area of IO-TiO2. In this study, for increasing surface area of IO-TiO2, we applied TiCl4 post treatment on IO-TiO2 and investigated the effect of the post treatment on photovoltaic properties of CdSe QD sensitized IO-TiO2 solar cells. It was found that Jsc could be enhanced due to TiCl4 post treatment, but decreased again for more than one cycle treatment, which indicates excess post treatment may lead to worse penetration of electrolyte. Our results indicate that the appropriate post treatment can improve the energy conversion efficiency of the QDSSCs.
Highlights
IntroductionWe have demonstrated that inverse opal (IO) structure TiO2 electrode, which has ordered periodic mesoporous structure, is useful for QDSSCs because of better penetration of electrolyte than conventional nanoparticulate structure [6]
We have found that open circuit voltage Voc of QDSSCs with Inverse opal (IO)-TiO2 electrodes was much higher (0.2 V) than that with nanoparticulate TiO2 electrodes
We have demonstrated that inverse opal (IO) structure TiO2 electrode, which has ordered periodic mesoporous structure, is useful for QDSSCs because of better penetration of electrolyte than conventional nanoparticulate structure [6]
Summary
We have demonstrated that inverse opal (IO) structure TiO2 electrode, which has ordered periodic mesoporous structure, is useful for QDSSCs because of better penetration of electrolyte than conventional nanoparticulate structure [6]. This structure has the possibility of enhancing the light harvesting efficiency, due to the slow light effect by photonic band gap which depends on the filling fraction of TiO2 in the IO structure [7]. To increase surface area of IO-TiO2, we have applied TiCl4 post treatment on IO-TiO2 and investigated the effect of the post treatment on photovoltaic properties of CdSe QD sensitized IO-TiO2 solar cells. We found that the photovoltaic performance changed systematically by increasing the TiCl4 post treatment cycles on IO-TiO2
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