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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Stevin PramanaORCiD
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In recent research in clean energy applications, clay has gained significant interest, especially as a gelator in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), for its capability to resolve the leakage issue of liquid electrolyte. In this paper, anionic hydrotalcite is utilized as a gelator to assist the formation of gel electrolyte in DSSCs. Three types of hydrotalcite with exchangeable anions, viz. NO3 - (CL-N), CO3 2- (CL-C) and SO4 2- (CL-S), were synthesized with similar morphologies via the co-precipitation method. It is observed that the gel formation of hydrotalcite strongly depends on the exchangeable anions present in the hydrotalcite. The objective of this work is to understand the effect of hydrotalcite anions on the photovoltage and the photocurrent in the gel electrolyte through electrochemical analysis. With increasing ion affinity, the Voc increases. This is attributed to Li+ intercalation with hydrotalcite compound resulting in the elevation of the conduction band of TiO2. With increasing ion affinity, the Jsc decreases. This is attributed to the decreasing diffusion coefficient of triiodide and the increasing difficulty in the injection process. For anions with low ion affinity in hydrotalcite, the diffusion of the redox couple is not significantly affected by the high viscosity of the gel. Furthermore, the study indicates that proper selection of hydrotalcite compounds not only produces a quasi-solid gel electrolyte, but also increases the efficiency of the solar cells: the device performance was improved from 7.8% (liquid electrolyte) to 8.4% (hydrotalcite gel electrolyte). © The Royal Society of Chemistry 2013.
Author(s): Wang X, Deng R, Kulkarni SA, Wang X, Pramana SS, Wong CC, Gratzel M, Uchida S, Mhaisalkar SG
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Journal of Materials Chemistry A
Year: 2013
Volume: 1
Issue: 13
Pages: 4345-4351
Print publication date: 07/04/2013
Online publication date: 24/01/2013
ISSN (print): 2050-7488
ISSN (electronic): 2050-7496
Publisher: Royal Society of Chemistry
URL: https://doi.org/10.1039/c3ta01581e
DOI: 10.1039/c3ta01581e
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