Nanoscale Research Letters

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Open Access Nano Express

Preparation, characterization, and application of titanium nano-tube array in dye-sensitized solar cells

Shih-Yu Ho1, Chaochin Su1*, Chieh-Chung Cheng1, Sasipriya Kathirvel1, Chung-Yen Li2 and Wen-Ren Li2*

Author Affiliations

1 Institute of Organic and Polymeric Materials, National Taipei University of Technology, Taipei, 10608, Taiwan, Republic of China

2 Department of Chemistry, National Central University, Chung-Li, 32001, Taiwan, Republic of China

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Nanoscale Research Letters 2012, 7:147 doi:10.1186/1556-276X-7-147

Published: 21 February 2012

Abstract

The vertically orientated TiO2 nanotube array (TNA) decorated with TiO2 nano-particles was successfully fabricated by electrochemically anodizing titanium (Ti) foils followed by Ti-precursor post-treatment and annealing process. The TNA morphology characterized by SEM and TEM was found to be filled with TiO2 nano-particles interior and exterior of the TiO2 nano-tubes after titanium (IV) n-butoxide (TnB) treatment, whereas TiO2 nano-particles were only found inside of TiO2 nano-tubes upon titanium tetrachloride (TiCl4) treatment. The efficiency in TNA-based DSSCs was improved by both TnB and TiCl4 treatment presumably due to the increase of dye adsorption.

Keywords:
TiO2; titanium tetrachloride; titanium (IV) n-butoxide; nano-tube; anodization; DSSCs