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Nanoporous platinum counter electrodes by glancing angle deposition for dye-sensitized solar cells

By Hsu, Sui-Ying; Tsai, Chih-Hung; Lu, Chun-Yang; Tsai, Yu-Tang; Huang, Tsung-Wei; Jhang, Yuan-Hsuan; Chen, Yan-Fang; Wu, Chung-Chih & Chen, Yen-Shan
Published in Organic Electronics 2012

Abstract

We report an effective way to produce nanoporous Pt counter electrodes of dye-sensitized solar cells by the glancing-angle deposition (GLAD) technique. By controlling the orientation of the substrate relative to the incident Pt vapor flux during the deposition, nanoporous films composed of inclined nm-scale columns were produced through the self-shadowing effect. Pt counter electrodes having varied nanoporous structures were characterized for their morphological and electrochemical properties, and were subjected to device studies to establish the correlation with DSSC characteristics/performances. The results suggest that the nanoporous GLAD Pt electrodes can effectively enhance active surface areas, the catalytic ability and charge exchange at the Pt/electrolyte interface of a DSSC. As a result, the quantum efficiency, short-circuit current, and power conversion efficiency of the DSSC can be enhanced by up to 12–13% with using the nanoporous GLAD Pt counter electrodes.

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