Syntheses of organic dyes based on phenothiazine as photosensitizers and effects of their π-conjugated bridges on the photovoltaic performances of dye-sensitized solar cells

• Published in: Macromolecular research Vol. 20; no. 2; pp. 128 - 137
• Main Authors: Kim, Ki-Hyun, Lee, Seung-Min, Seo, Min-Hye, Cho, Sang-Eun, Hwang, Won-Pill, Park, Sung-Hae, Kim, Young-Keun, Lee, Jin-Kook, Kim, Mi-Ra
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Heidelberg The Polymer Society of Korea 01.02.2012; 한국고분자학회
• Subjects: Characterization and Evaluation of Materials; Chemistry; Chemistry and Materials Science; Complex Fluids and Microfluidics; Nanochemistry; Nanotechnology; Physical Chemistry; Polymer Sciences; Soft and Granular Matter; 고분자공학; phenothiazine; dyes; dye-sensitized solar cells; sensitizers; photovoltaic effect
• ISSN: 1598-5032; 2092-7673
• DOI: 10.1007/s13233-012-0017-2

Three organic dyes, 2-cyano-3-( N -hexylphenothiazine-3-yl)acrylic acid (H-PTZ), 2-cyano-3-(5′-(2-( N hexylphenothiazine-3-yl)vinyl)-2,2′-bithiophen-5-yl)acrylic acid (H-PTZ-BT), and 2-cyano-3-(5-(4-((4-(2-( N -hexylphenothiazine-3-yl)vinyl)phenyl)(phenyl)amino)phenyl)thiophen-2-yl)acrylic acid (H-PTZ-TPA-T), based on the phenothiazine (PTZ) unit as an electron donor moiety and cyanoacrylic acid unit as an electron acceptor moiety were synthesized to study the effect of a π -conjugated bridge of the dye on the performance of the resulting dye-sensitized solar cells devices. The thiophene unit and triphenylamine were introduced as a π -conjugated bridge. The H-PTZTPA-T-sensitized cell showed the highest overall conversion efficiency of 4.01% ( J sc : 9.64 mA·cm −2 ; V oc : 0.69 V; FF: 0.60), while the H-PTZ-sensitized cell showed the lowest value of 3.57% ( J sc : 7.76 mA·cm −2 ; V oc : 0.70 V; FF: 0.65) among the cells based on the three organic dyes compared to 5.09% for the cell based on the N719 dye ( J sc : 12.77 mA·cm −2 ; V oc : 0.72 V; FF: 0.55) under AM 1.5 illumination (100 mW·cm −2 ).