Biotemplated Synthesis of TiO₂-Coated Gold Nanowire for Perovskite Solar Cells

Abstract

Fibrous nanomaterials have been widely employed toward the improvement of photovoltaic devices. Their light-trapping capabilities, owing to their unique structure, provide a direct pathway for carrier transport. This paper reports the improvement of perovskite solar cell (PSC) performance by a well-dispersed TiO 2 -coated gold nanowire (GNW) in a TiO 2 cell layer. We used an artificially designed cage-shaped protein to synthesize a TiO 2 -coated GNW in aqueous solution under atmospheric pressure. The artificially cage-shaped protein with gold-binding peptides and titanium-compound-biomineralizing peptides can bind GNWs and selectively deposit a thin TiO 2 layer on the gold surface. The TiO 2 -coated GNW incorporated in the photoelectrodes of PSCs increased the external quantum efficiency within the range of 350–750 nm and decreased the internal resistance by 12%. The efficient collection of photogenerated electrons by the nanowires boosted the power conversion efficiency by 33% compared to a typical mesoporous-TiO 2 -nanoparticle-only electrode.

Advances of Commercial and Biological Materials for Electron Transport Layers in Biological Applications

“… Inoue et al (2017) designed a novel biological functional protein based on the listeria innocua Dps protein (named TDG1). This artificial caged protein containing gold-binding peptides can bind to gold nanowire and selectively deposit a thin layer of TiO 2 on the gold surface.…”