Full-ionic liquid gel electrolytes: Enhanced photovoltaic performances in dye-sensitized solar cells

Liquid electrolytes containing redox species have been widely used in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), whereas the volatility of organic solvents has been a tremendous obstacle for their commercial application. To assemble durable DSSCs, here we report the synthesis of full-ionic liquid electrolyte, in which 1-butyl-3-methylimidazolium nitrate is employed as solvent and 1-methyl-3-propylimidazolium iodide is iodide source. Using the imbibition performance of amphiphilic poly(acrylic acid/gelatin) [poly(AA/GR)] and poly(acrylic acid/cetyltrimethyl ammonium bromide) [poly(AA/CTAB)] matrices, full-ionic liquid electrolytes are imbibed into three-dimensional framework of poly(AA/GR) or poly(AA/CTAB) to form stable gel electrolytes. Room-temperature ionic conductivities as high as 17.82 and 18.44 mS cm(-1) are recorded from full-ionic liquid imbibed poly(AA/GR) and poly(AA/CTAB) gel electrolytes, respectively. Promising power conversion efficiencies of 7.19% and 7.15% are determined from their DSSC devices in comparison with 6.55% and 6.12% from traditional acetonitrile-based poly(AA/GR) and poly(AA/CTAB) gel electrolytes, respectively. The new concept along with easy fabrication demonstrates the full-ionic liquid electrolytes to be good alternatives for robust gel electrolytes in quasi-solid-state DSSCs. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.