Surface treatment of TiO2 films for dye-sensitized solar cells using atmospheric-pressure non-equilibrium DC pulse discharge plasma jet

In this paper, we report the utilization of the DC pulse discharge plasma jet technique as a means for the preparation of titanium oxide (TiO 2 ) films on fluorine dope tin oxide (FTO) coated glass substrates used for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). The TiO 2 film made on these experimental bases exhibited the BET specific surface area of 95 m 2 /g, the pore volume of 0.3 cm 2 /g and the TEM particle size of ∼25 nm. The DSCs made by the TiO 2 film exhibited an energy conversion efficiency of 5.7% at 100 mW/cm 2 light intensity. Consequently, we believe that the optimization between the specific surface area and photocurrent density of TiO 2 film was achieved by the plasma surface treatment which also contributed to the improvement of energy conversion efficiency of DSCs.