Plasmon-enhanced dye-sensitized solar cells through porphyrin-silver nanoparticle hybrid structures: Experimental and computational studies

Abstract

Surface plasmon resonance of silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) was used to improve light absorption of porphyrins in plasmon-enhanced porphyrin-sensitized solar cells (PSSCs). Porphyrins with different substituents consisting –H, -Me, -MeO, –F, -Cl, -Br, –CO2H, –SO3H, –NO2, and –NH2 were used to study the effect of the interactions between photoactive dye molecules and plasmonic Ag NPs on the performance of PSSCs. The obtained results revealed that zinc tetra(4-carboxyphenyl)porphyrin and zinc tetra(4-aminophenyl)porphyrin have made the biggest impact on the performance of plasmon-enhanced PSSCs. Computational studies were done to study the electronic properties of porphyrin molecules with electron-withdrawing and electron-donating substituents interacted with Ag NPs. The theoretical studies confirmed that the electronic nature of substituents of porphyrins has a considerable effect on the electronic properties of porphyrin-AgNPs systems. In continue, [email protected] core-shell NPs were prepared to overcome the challenge of corrosion of Ag plasmonic nanoparticles. The results showed that using [email protected] systems, in many cases, the performance of PSSCs is increased relative to corresponding porphyrins but is decreased relative to porphyrin-AgNPs systems.