Electrophoretic deposition of plasmonic nanocomposite for the fabrication of dye-sensitized solar cells

摘要

TiO2-Ag nanocomposites have been prepared by hydrothermal process for the preparation of photoelectrode for dye-sensitized solar cells. The formation of TiO2-Ag nanocomposites have been confirmed by the transmission electron microscopy (TEM), UV-Vis spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction and energy dispersive X-ray analysis. The I'EM images confirm that silver nanoparticles of average size 30 nm are dispersed inside the TiO2 matrix. Electrophoretic deposition technique (EPD) is successfully utilized to incorporate TiO2-Ag nanocomposites in commercially available TiO2 nanoparticle to prepare photoelectrode on transparent oxide substrate. Incorporation of TiO2-Ag nanocomposites by EPD technique has been done in different ways: in all the layers of TiO2 photoelectrode and in only the top layer of TiO2 photoelectrode. X-ray diffraction, field effect scanning electron microscopy in back scattered mode and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy study confirm the presence of TiO2-Ag nanostructure in prepared photoelectrode. The current-voltage characteristic shows 78% and 67% enhancement of photocurrent and power conversion efficiency (PCE) respectively in the DSSC with Ag incorporated photoelectrode compared to the cell without Ag nanoparticles and maximum PCE obtained in DSSC with TiO2-Ag is 7.5%.