Preparation Of High Efficiency TiO₂Photoanode For Dye-sensitized Solar Cells

Dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) is a kind of low-cost, environmentally friendly solar cell, which imitates the principles of plant photosynthesis and has a good commercial prospect. In DSSC, one of the key components is TiO2anode, which plays an important role in determining the device efficiency. The main purpose in this study is to find the best preparation method for TiO2photoanode and obtain higher performance DSSC device by optimization the TiO2films preparation condition. To this end, the followings are studied in the paper:1. An anatase nano-powder of TiO2, which is the effective crystalline for DSSC anode, was successfully made by sol-gel and hydrothermal process with the precursor of TBT (Tetrabutyl-orthotitanate). In this aspect, we studied different synthesis conditions, such as hydrothermal temperature, the influence of acetic acid, etc, which are critical for the translational converstion among different TiO2polymorphs. Under our optimized condition, the product was proved to be pure anatase phase by XRD analysis.2. Doctor-blade coating technique is a common method for preparation of TiO2anode in laboratory research. In this study, the membrane with the home-made anatase is made by doctor-blade method and then it is utilized as the anode to prepare the cell. The impacts of peptization time and TiCl4treatment on the photovoltaic properties of the as-prepared DSSC are studied.3. Electrostatic spray (ES) started to attract attention on TiO2electrodes preparation in recent years, it is very suitable for preparing the porous nano-film. The dispersion condition of the TiO2susupension is investigated by using the ultrasound and dynamic particle scattering; following it, the different morphology of the porous nano-TiO2films are achieved. By analyzing the SEM photos of the film, the comprehensive discussion about the preparation mechanism with ES and its impacts on the cell performance are given. By optimizing, the photoanode with high power conversion efficiency of6.24%is achieved by electrostatic spray. Additionally, an introduction of tetrabutyl titanate in ES procedure is tested, which has never been reported before, its impact on the anode and the DSSC cell are also discussed.