Organic dyes incorporating oligothienylenevinylene for efficient dye-sensitized solar cells.

Two new organic dyes incorporating triphenylamine as a donor and oligothienylenevinylene as a bridge have been synthesized. The new dyes cover the entire visible region and have a power conversion of up to 6.25%.

Triplication of the photocurrent in dye solar cells by increasing the elongation of the π-conjugation in Zn-porphyrin sensitizers.

Porphyrins are promising sensitizers for dye solar cells (DSCs) but narrow absorption bands at 400-450 and 500-650 nm limit their light-harvesting properties. Increasing elongation of the π-conjugation and loss of symmetry causes broadening and a red-shift of the absorption bands, which considerably improves the performance of the DSC. Herein we use an oligothienylenevinylene to bridge a Zn-porphyrin system and the anchoring group of the sensitizer. We separately study the performance of the two basic units: oligothienylenevinylene and Zn-porphyrin. The combined system provides a three-fold enhancement of the photocurrent with respect to parent dyes. This is caused by an additional strong absorption in the region 400-650 nm that leads to flat IPCE of 60%. Theoretical calculations support that the addition of the oligothienylenevinylene unit as a linking bridge creates a charge transfer band that transforms a Zn-porphyrin dye into a push-pull type system with highly efficient charge injection properties.

Electron transfer dynamics in dye-sensitized solar cells utilizing oligothienylvinylene derivates as organic sensitizers.

Two new organic dyes have been synthesized and used as efficient light-harvesting materials in molecular photovoltaic devices. These dyes are based on conjugated thienylvinylene units, with FL-4 consisting of a four-unit thienylvinylene oligomer and its homologue FL-7 which additionally incorporates the electron-donating triphenylamine unit (TPA) into its structure. Upon light excitation both dyes show efficient electron injection into the TiO2 conduction band and slow back electron transfer to the oxidized dye. In fact, for FL-7, the back electron transfer dynamics are slower owing to efficient hole transfer to the TPA moiety situated further from the semiconductor surface. However, the electron recombination kinetics with the oxidized electrolyte for both FL-4 and FL-7 in dye-sensitized solar cells are faster than for devices made using the ruthenium dye N719. We believe that this is a serious limiting factor for devices based on oligothiophenes which, despite showing higher molecular extinction coefficients in the vis-NIR region of the solar spectrum, still cannot challenge the light-to-energy conversion efficiency of N719 or other ruthenium polypyridyl complexes.