Effect of hydrocarbon chain length of amphiphilic ruthenium dyes on solid-state dye-sensitized photovoltaics.

Schmidt-Mende, Lukas; Kroeze, Jessica E; Durrant, James R; Nazeeruddin, M K; Grätzel, Michael · Nano Lett · 2005

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

We studied the influence of the hydrophobic hydrocarbon chain length of amphiphilic ruthenium dyes on the device performance in solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells. We found that the dyes with longer hydrocarbon chains gave higher efficiency values when used as a sensitizer in solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells. With increasing chain length, we observed higher currents and open-circuit voltages up to a limiting chain length. We attribute this improvement to the expected larger distance between TiO2 and the hole conductor, which seems to suppress recombination effectively.

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