Issue 78, 2016, Issue in Progress

3D bicontinuous SnO2/TiO2 core/shell structures for highly efficient organic dye-sensitized solar cell electrodes

Abstract

A photoelectrode for high performance photon-to-electron conversion devices has been developed with various material and structural aspects. For this purpose, one facile approach is introducing hybrid nanostructures. Here, we demonstrated SnO2/TiO2 core/shell hybrid structures with a 3D bicontinuous morphology. We evaluated the effect of the electrode film thickness and the TiO2 shell thickness on the photovoltaic properties using photocurrent–voltage measurements and intensity-modulated photovoltage/photocurrent spectroscopy. As the film and the shell thicknesses increase, we observe a decrease in the charge collection efficiency, whereas the amount of dye adsorbed increases. At the optimum conditions, we obtain the highest photocurrent density of 19.06 mA cm−2 and a conversion efficiency of 8.21% with a 12 μm-thick film and 180 nm-thick shell electrode for dye-sensitized solar cells. The 3D bicontinuous SnO2/TiO2 core/shell electrode is compared with the TiO2/TiO2 electrode to evaluate the effect of the SnO2 core on the photovoltaic properties, and the presence of the SnO2 core enhances the trap-free charge transport mode and significantly enlarges the charge diffusion length by up to 5 times. We believe these results show that the 3D bicontinuous core/shell electrode may be coupled with other sensitizing dyes or quantum dots, as well as redox ions or hole transport materials, to obtain highly efficient photovoltaic or photoelectrochemical devices.

Graphical abstract: 3D bicontinuous SnO2/TiO2 core/shell structures for highly efficient organic dye-sensitized solar cell electrodes

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
15 Apr 2016
Accepted
22 Jul 2016
First published
04 Aug 2016

RSC Adv., 2016,6, 74003-74008

3D bicontinuous SnO2/TiO2 core/shell structures for highly efficient organic dye-sensitized solar cell electrodes

C. Cho, S. Baek, K. Kim and J. H. Moon, RSC Adv., 2016, 6, 74003 DOI: 10.1039/C6RA09810J

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