Open Access Nano Express

Mesoporous nitrogen-doped TiO2 sphere applied for quasi-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cell

Peng Xiang, Xiong Li, Heng Wang, Guanghui Liu, Ting Shu, Ziming Zhou, Zhiliang Ku, Yaoguang Rong, Mi Xu, Linfeng Liu, Min Hu, Ying Yang, Wei Chen, Tongfa Liu, Meili Zhang and Hongwei Han*

Author Affiliations

Michael Grätzel Center for Mesoscopic Solar Cells, Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Wuhan, 430074, Hubei, People's Republic of China

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Nanoscale Research Letters 2011, 6:606 doi:10.1186/1556-276X-6-606

Published: 24 November 2011

Abstract

A mesoscopic nitrogen-doped TiO2 sphere has been developed for a quasi-solid-state dye-sensitized solar cell [DSSC]. Compared with the undoped TiO2 sphere, the quasi-solid-state DSSC based on the nitrogen-doped TiO2 sphere shows more excellent photovoltaic performance. The photoelectrochemistry of electrodes based on nitrogen-doped and undoped TiO2 spheres was characterized with Mott-Schottky analysis, intensity modulated photocurrent spectroscopy, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy, which indicated that both the quasi-Fermi level and the charge transport of the photoelectrode were improved after being doped with nitrogen. As a result, a photoelectric conversion efficiency of 6.01% was obtained for the quasi-solid-state DSSC.