Issue 21, 2013
From the journal:

RSC Advances

Structural variations of D–π–A dyes influence on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells†

Magdalena Marszalek,‡a   Satyawan Nagane,‡b   Amol Ichake,b   Robin Humphry-Baker,a   Vincent Paul,*b   Shaik M. Zakeeruddin*a  and  Michael Grätzel*a  

* Corresponding authors

a Laboratory for Photonics and Interfaces, Institute of Chemical Sciences and Engineering, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
E-mail: shaik.zakeer@epfl.ch, michael.graetzel@epfl.ch
Fax: +41 (0)21 693 61 00
Tel: +41 (0)21 693 31 12

b Room 288, Organic Chemistry Division, National Chemical Laboratory, Pashan Road, Pune 411008, India
E-mail: vp.swamy@ncl.res.in
Fax: +91 (0)20 2590 2629
Tel: +91 (0)20 2590 2443

Abstract

Two new organic D–π–A dyes containing identical π-conjugated spacer and anchoring/acceptor moieties but different donor groups were designed and synthesized. These dyes containing didodecyl-cyclopentadithiophene (CPDT) as a spacer, cyanoacrylic acid as an acceptor and N-butyl-carbazole or N-butyl-phenothiazine moieties as electron donor groups are labelled as V4 and V11 dyes, respectively. The variation in the donor group of these two dyes, that influences the photophysical, electrochemical and photovoltaic parameters, was investigated. The highest photovoltaic conversion efficiency of 7.5% was obtained with V4 dye at AM 1.5 G full sunlight intensity (100 mWcm−2). Comparison of phenothiazine donor dyes with two different π-conjugated spacers, CPDT (V11) and vinyl thiophene (V7) containing devices shows that the Voc of V7 dye is lower than that of V11 due to the downward shift of the conduction band edge. Transient photovoltage and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy measurements were performed to explain the differences in the PV parameters by varying the donors and/or spacer groups.

Graphical abstract: Structural variations of D–π–A dyes influence on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells

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Article information

DOI
https://doi.org/10.1039/C3RA22249G
Article type
Paper
Submitted
23 Sep 2012
Accepted
14 Mar 2013
First published
14 Mar 2013

RSC Adv., 2013,3, 7921-7927

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Structural variations of D–π–A dyes influence on the photovoltaic performance of dye-sensitized solar cells

M. Marszalek, S. Nagane, A. Ichake, R. Humphry-Baker, V. Paul, S. M. Zakeeruddin and M. Grätzel, RSC Adv., 2013, 3, 7921 DOI: 10.1039/C3RA22249G

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