One-Pot Low Temperature Synthesis and Characterization Studies of Nanocrystalline α-Fe2O3 Based Dye Sensitized Solar Cells

Dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) based alpha-Fe2O3 nanostructures with two different morphologies, such as nanorods (Fe0NRs) and nanoparticles (FeONPs), were synthesized by one-pot low temperature method. The crystal structure and phase purity of the as-prepared samples were characterized by X-ray powder diffraction (XRD) and further determined by Rietveld refinements XRD analysis. The average crystallite size was calculated using Debye Sherrer formula, and it shows the range of 9.43-26.56 nm. The morphologies of the products were studied by high resolution scanning electron microscopy (HR-SEM) and it was confirmed by high resolution transmission electron microscopy (HR-TEM). The formation of pure alpha-Fe2O3 samples was further confirmed by energy dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis. The optical properties and the band gap energy (E-g) were measured by UV-Visible diffuse reflectance spectra (DRS) and photoluminescence (PL) spectra. The band gap energy was measured using Kubelka-Munk method, and the values are decreased from 2.36 eV to 2.21 eV as the temperature increased from 300 to 400 degrees C with increasing the crystallite size. Magnetic hysteresis (M-H) loop revealed that the as-prepared alpha-Fe2O3 samples displayed ferromagnetic behavior. FeONRs sample shows higher saturation magnetization (M-s) value (40.21 emu/g) than FeONPs sample (23.06 emu/g). The dye-sensitized solar cell based on the optimized FeONRs array reaches a conversion efficiency of 0.43%, which is higher than that obtained from FeONPs (0.29%) under the light radiation of 1000 W/m(2).