Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells Based on ZnO Nanorods Array

Abstract

Kim et al. suggest that replacing ZnO particle with ZnO vertically aligned nanorods shows much higher energy conversion efficiency [1]. The difference between nanoparticles and nanorods can be seen on figure 1. Yet, vertically aligned nanorods can be grown through the difficult and expensive methods. Pomar et al. reported the growing through atomic layer deposition (ALD) method [2]. Jeong et al. grew the vertically aligned nanorods using metal-organic chemical vapor deposition (MOCVD) method with really high temperature (700-900oC) [3]. When the nanorods are applied for DSSCs, synthesizing really fine nanorods is not necessary. Lee et al. managed to grow nanorods on the seed layer for DSSC application which was post-annealed at 500-600oC [4]. Hu et al. reported vertically aligned nanorods using low temperature chemical bath method, but the deposition time is between 3 hours and 6 days [5].

Characteristics of dye-sensitized solar cell with TiO2 anode under UV irradiation

“…TiO 2 anode with higher porosity has higher surface area for higher dye absorption. A sintering temperature can increase TiO 2 porosity [5]. For networking, strong chemical bonding among TiO 2 particles and between TiO 2 particles and substrate is formed via hydroxides (-OH) by dehydration [6].…”