MoO3 surface passivation on TiO2: An efficient approach to minimize loss in fill factor and maximum power of dye sensitized solar cell.
- Resource Type
- Article
- Authors
- Gopakumar, Gopika; Ashok, Aditya; Vijayaraghavan, S.N.; Nair, Shantikumar V.; Shanmugam, Mariyappan
- Source
- Applied Surface Science. Jul2018, Vol. 447, p554-560. 7p.
- Subject
- *SOLAR cells
*TITANIUM dioxide
*PHYSICAL vapor deposition
*MOLYBDENUM compounds
*THIN films
*OPEN-circuit voltage
- Language
- ISSN
- 0169-4332
The present study demonstrates the possibility for improving the performance of dye sensitized solar cell (DSSC) only by minimizing the loss in fill factor ( FF ) and maximum power point ( P MAX ) which can be achieved by passivating the nanocrystalline titanium dioxide (TiO 2 ) using physical vapor deposited molybdenum trioxide (MoO 3 ) thin films. The effect of MoO 3 coated TiO 2 on charge carrier transport was examined in resulting DSSCs and observed that ∼14% enhancement in efficiency is possible for 5 min passivation of MoO 3 on TiO 2 . The physical vapor deposited MoO 3 films were ∼75% transparent in the spectral range of 350–800 nm with an optical bandgap of ∼3.1 eV. The wide bandgap MoO 3 films facilitate the incoming photons to reach the sensitizing dye to generate excitons. The 14% enhancement in the performance of DSSC by MoO 3 passivation is observed through improving only the FF and P MAX while it does not contribute anything significantly to current density and open circuit voltage. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopic studies further confirmed these observations through photo-electron lifetime, which remains constant both in the bulk of pristine TiO 2 and MoO 3 passivated TiO 2 and it further confirms the effect of MoO 3 passivation on FF and P MAX in DSSCs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]