Branched ZnO nanowires have been fabricated on conductive glass substrates via a solvothermal method for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). The 1D branched nanostructures can afford a direct conduction pathway instead of interparticle hops while using nanoparticles. Furthermore, the short-circuit current density and the energy conversion efficiency of the branched ZnO nanowire DSCs are 4.27 mA/cm 2 and 1.51%, which are twice as high as the bare ZnO nanowire ones. The improvement was a consequence of the enlargement of the internal surface area within the photoelectrode and allowed us to achieve higher dye adsorption to significantly enhance the performance of the DSCs.

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The tetrapod-like ZnO nanopowders are employed to construct an efficient electron transport network as the photoanode of the dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). Due to the high extinction coefficient of the metal-free D149 dye offering a high photocurrent through the ZnO network, the best performance of DSCs based on a 42 mm terapod-like ZnO film showed a high energy conversion efficiency of 4.9% with a high short-circuit photocurrent density of 12.3 mA cm À2 , an open-circuit photovoltage of 0.6 V, and a fill factor of 0.65 under AM 1.5 irradiation. Highly efficient electron transport may also be ascribed by a long effective electron diffusion length of 46 mm determined from the electrochemical impedance spectroscopy which is consistent with thickness dependent J SC measurements.

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