Mesoporous TiO2 anodes for efficient dye-sensitized solar cells: An efficiency of 9.86% under one sun illumination.

Enhancement of power conversion efficiency has been a long-term objective for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). In the current work, mesoporous TiO 2 anodes are synthesized by a gel-hydrothermal method using polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) as a pore-forming agent in order to elevate the dye loading, incident light illumination for dye excitation as well as electron transportation along conducting channels from TiO 2 nanoparticles. In comparison with dense TiO 2 anode, the dye illumination is also significantly enhanced, resulting in an increased photoelectron density on conduction band of TiO 2 . The photovoltaic performances are optimized by adjusting PVP dosage in synthesizing mesoporous TiO 2 anode. An impressive power conversion efficiency of 9.86% is recorded under one sun illumination. The power conversion efficiency is increased by ∼53.8% in comparison with the dense TiO 2 anode based DSSC. The high conversion efficiency in combination with simple preparation demonstrates the potential use of the approach in designing efficient DSSCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]