Effect of nanostructured electrode architecture and semiconductor deposition strategy on the photovoltaic performance of quantum dot sensitized solar cells

Abstract

Here we analyze the effect of two relevant aspects related to cell preparation on with decreasing surface area and for cells using CBD growth method. This is systematically correlated to a higher recombination resistance of CBD sensitized electrodes.Electron injection kinetics from QDs into TiO 2 also depends on both the TiO 2 structure and the QDs deposition method, being systematically faster for CBD. Only for electrodes prepared with small TiO 2 nanoparticles SILAR method presents better performance than CBD, indicating that the small pore size disturb the CBD growth method. These results could have important implications for the optimization of QDSCs.3

Harnessing Infrared Photons for Photoelectrochemical Hydrogen Generation. A PbS Quantum Dot Based “Quasi-Artificial Leaf”

“…Particularly, in order to achieve higher H 2 generation rates, morphological optimization of the TiO 2 structure is an important issue to be addressed, since it has been proven that structures with lower surface area lead to better performance of quantum dot sensitized solar cells based on these structures. 37,38 Doping has also demonstrated to enhance TiO 2 conductivity and minimize transport losses. 14 Additionally, the presence of PbS enhances charge recombination, (the lower IPCE values in the range 350-550 nm when PbS is included in the structure is a good evidence) and efficient passivation strategies need to be developed as previously done with colloidal PbS QDs.…”

High performance PbS Quantum Dot Sensitized Solar Cells exceeding 4% efficiency: the role of metal precursors in the electron injection and charge separation

“…It has been showed that CdS/CdSe QDSCs grown by CBD systematically exhibit higher open circuit voltage, V oc , compared to QDs grown by SILAR. 16 Here we show that the selection of the metallic precursors to grow PbS/CdS QDs by SILAR has a dramatic effect on the final QDSC performance.…”

“…Inorganic semiconductors can be prepared following many different synthetic routes and the growth method has a significant influence on their properties. 15,16 As an example, colloidal chemistry offers a precise control over the crystalline properties and size of the semiconductor material.…”

“…15 However, the photovoltaic efficiency of solar cells with colloidal QDs is significantly enhanced when inverted type-I CdS/CdSe core/shell QDs are employed. 22 In order to increase QD loading, in-situ growth of the inorganic semiconductor on nanostructured photoanode can be carried out by low cost solution techniques as Chemical Bath Deposition (CBD) 16,[23][24][25] or Successive Ionic Layer Absorption and Reaction (SILAR). [26][27][28] The advantage of higher QD loading is partially balanced by the lower control over the QD growth conditions.…”

Efficiency enhancement of PbS quantum dots-sensitized nanocrystalline SnO2 thin film prepared by two-phase method

“…However, the light-to-electric conversion efficiency of QDSSCs is still lower than that of dye-sensitized solar cells [1,2]. The interfacial properties between each component to fabricate QDSSCs are important to determine the final lightto-electric conversion efficiency [3].…”