Journal
NATURE MATERIALS
Volume 9, Issue 1, Pages 31-35Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/NMAT2588
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Funding
- Victorian Government
- ARC Centre of Excellence for Electromaterials Science (ACES)
- German Academic Exchange Service
- International Science Linkage Project [CG 100059]
- Australian Research Fellowship
- Monash University
- Alexander von Humboldt Foundation
- German Science Foundation (DFG) [SFB 569]
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Thin-film dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs) based on mesoporous semiconductor electrodes are low-cost alternatives to conventional silicon devices(1,2). High-efficiency DSCs typically operate as photoanodes (n-DSCs), where photocurrents result from dye-sensitized electron injection into n-type semiconductors. Dye-sensitized photocathodes (p-DSCs) operate in an inverse mode, where dye-excitation is followed by rapid electron transfer from a p-type semiconductor to the dye (dye-sensitized hole injection). Such p-DSCs and n-DSCs can be combined to construct tandem solar cells(3) (pn-DSCs) with a theoretical efficiency limitation well beyond that of single-junction DSCs (ref. 4). Nevertheless, the efficiencies of such tandem pn-DSCs have so far been hampered by the poor performance of the available p-DSCs (refs 3, 5-15). Here we show for the first time that p-DSCs can convert absorbed photons to electrons with yields of up to 96%, resulting in a sevenfold increase in energy conversion efficiency compared with previously reported photocathodes(7). The donor-acceptor dyes, studied as photocathodic sensitizers, comprise a variable-length oligothiophene bridge, which provides control over the spatial separation of the photo-generated charge carriers. As a result, charge recombination is decelerated by several orders of magnitude and tandem pn-DSCs can be constructed that exceed the efficiency of their individual components.
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