Significant enhancement in the power-conversion efficiency of chlorophyll co-sensitized solar cells by mimicking the principles of natural photosynthetic light-harvesting complexes.
Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) are similar to natural photosynthesis in the initial processes involving in light-harvesting and charge separation. In order to mimic those natural photosynthetic systems mainly containing multiple pigments, six different chlorophyllous sensitizers have been isolated from natural photosynthetic organism or synthesized based on natural photosynthetic precursors, and used for fabricating DSSCs. These dye sensitizers can be placed into three classes, i.e., a-type, b-type, or c-type, based on the structural similarity to their analogs of the natural photosynthesis pigments chlorophylls a, b, and c. We succeeded in demonstrating homogeneous co-sensitization among these analogues when these were present together on mesoporous TiO2 films, and we measured the photovoltaic performance of the resulting chlorophyll-sensitized solar cells. Significantly enhanced power-conversion efficiencies (eta) were achieved with DSSCs based on co-sensitization of a chlorophyll a derivative with a chlorophyll b or c derivative. A highest power-conversion efficiency of up to 5.4% has been obtained. These results suggest that it is possible to apply multiple pigments and the energy transfer mechanism from natural photosynthetic systems in fabricating high-efficiency DSSCs.
Wang
Xiao-Feng
XF
Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Science and Technology, Kwansei Gakuin University, 2-1 Gakuen, Sanda, Hyogo 669-1337, Japan. wangxf@gifu-u.ac.jp
Koyama
Yasushi
Y
Kitao
Osamu
O
Wada
Yuji
Y
Sasaki
Shin-Ich
SI
Tamiaki
Hitoshi
H
Zhou
Haoshen
H
D040761:Biomimetic Materials; D002734:Chlorophyll / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000528:radiation effects; D011211:Electric Power Supplies; D004735:Energy Transfer; D004867:Equipment Design; D019544:Equipment Failure Analysis; D008027:Light; D045342:Light-Harvesting Protein Complexes / Q000737:chemistry* / Q000378:metabolism*; D010788:Photosynthesis / Q000502:physiology*; D012993:Solar Energy
D045342:Light-Harvesting Protein Complexes; D002734:Chlorophyll