Highly soluble energy relay dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells

George Y. Margulis; Bogyu Lim; Brian E. Hardin; Eva L. Unger; Jun-Ho Yum; Johann M. Feckl; Dina Fattakhova-Rohlfing; Thomas Bein; Michael Grätzel; Alan Sellinger; Michael D. McGehee

doi:10.1039/C3CP51018B

Highly soluble energy relay dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells†

George Y. Margulis,‡^a Bogyu Lim,‡^b Brian E. Hardin,^c Eva L. Unger,^b Jun-Ho Yum,^d Johann M. Feckl,^e Dina Fattakhova-Rohlfing,^e Thomas Bein,^e Michael Grätzel,^d Alan Sellinger*^f and Michael D. McGehee*^b

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* Corresponding authors

^a Department of Applied Physics, Stanford University, McCullough Building, 476 Lomita Mall, Stanford, CA, USA

^b Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Stanford University, McCullough Building, 476 Lomita Mall, Stanford, CA, USA
E-mail: mmcgehee@stanford.edu

^c The Molecular Foundry, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 67 Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, CA, USA

^d Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, 1015 Lausanne, Switzerland
E-mail: michael.graetzel@epfl.ch

^e Department of Chemistry and Center for NanoScience (CeNS), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München, Butenandtstr. 5–13 (E), Gerhard-Ertl-Building, München, Germany
E-mail: bein@lmu.de

^f Department of Chemistry and Geochemistry, Colorado School of Mines, Coolbaugh Hall, 1012 14th Street, Golden, CO 80401, USA
E-mail: aselli@mines.edu

Abstract

High solubility is a requirement for energy relay dyes (ERDs) to absorb a large portion of incident light and significantly improve the efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Two benzonitrile-soluble ERDs, BL302 and BL315, were synthesized, characterized, and resulted in a 65% increase in the efficiency of TT1-sensitized DSSCs. The high solubility (180 mM) of these ERDs allows for absorption of over 95% of incident light at their peak wavelength. The overall power conversion efficiency of DSSCs with BL302 and BL315 was found to be limited by their energy transfer efficiency of approximately 70%. Losses due to large pore size, dynamic collisional quenching of the ERD, energy transfer to desorbed sensitizing dyes and static quenching by complex formation were investigated and it was found that a majority of the losses are caused by the formation of statically quenched ERDs in solution.

Physical Chemistry Chemical Physics

Highly soluble energy relay dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells†

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