Locally placed nanoscale gold islands film within a TiO2 photoanode for enhanced plasmon light absorption in dye sensitized solar cells

Taeheon Kim, Yogeenth Kumaresan, Sung Jun Cho, Chang Lyoul Lee, Heon Lee, Gun Young Jung

    Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

    2 Citations (Scopus)

    Abstract

    As metal nanostructures demonstrated extraordinary plasmon resonance, their optical characteristics have widely been investigated in photo-electronic applications. However, there has been no clear demonstration on the location effect of plasmonic metal layer within the photoanode on both optical characteristics and photovoltaic performances. In this research, the gold (Au) nano-islands (NIs) film was embedded at different positions within the TiO2 nanoparticulate photoanode in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC) to check the effect of plasmon resonance location on the device performance; at the top, in the middle, at the bottom of the TiO2 photoanode, and also at all the three positions. The Au NIs were fabricated by annealing a Au thin film at 550 °C. The DSSC having the Au NIs-embedded TiO2 photoanode exhibited an increase in short circuit currents (Jsc) and power conversion efficiency (PCE) owing to the plasmon resonance absorption. Thus, the PCE was increased from 5.92% (reference: only TiO2 photoanode) to 6.52% when the Au NIs film was solely positioned at the bottom, in the middle or at the top of TiO2 film. When the Au NIs films were placed at all the three positions, the Jsc was increased by 16% compared to the reference cell, and consequently the PCE was further increased to 7.01%.

    Original languageEnglish
    Article number33
    JournalNano Convergence
    Volume3
    Issue number1
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 2016 Dec

    Bibliographical note

    Publisher Copyright:
    © The Author(s) 2016.

    Keywords

    • Absorption enhancement
    • Dye-sensitized solar cell
    • Photoanode
    • Surface plasmon resonance

    ASJC Scopus subject areas

    • General Materials Science
    • General Engineering

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