Improvement in dye-sensitized solar cells with a ZnO-coated TiO2 electrode by rf magnetron sputtering

A surface modification method was carried out by rf magnetron sputtering to fabricate ZnO-coated TiO2 electrodes (TiO2/ZnO) for improving the performance of dye-sensitized solar cells. The TiO2/ZnO electrodes had been characterized by x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy, scanning electron microscopy, UV-visible spectrophotometer, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy. The study results revealed that the TiO2 modification suppresses interfacial recombination. Sputtering ZnO for 3 min on 5 mu m TiO2 greatly improves all cell parameters, resulting in increasing efficiency from 4.76% to 6.55%. (c) 2008 American Institute of Physics.