title: Dithiafulvenyl unit as a new donor for high-efficiency dye-sensitized solar cells: synthesis and demonstration of a family of metal-free organic sensitizers.
abstract: This work identifies the dithiafulvenyl unit as an excellent electron donor for constructing D-π-A-type metal-free organic sensitizers of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). Synthesized and tested are three sensitizers all with this donor and a cyanoacrylic acid acceptor but differing in the phenyl (DTF-C1), biphenyl (DTF-C2), and phenyl-thiopheneyl-phenyl π-bridges (DTF-C3). Devices based on these dyes exhibit a dramatically improved performance with the increasing π-bridge length, culminating with DTF-C3 in η = 8.29% under standard global AM 1.5 illumination.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Kowloon, Hong Kong, China.
authors.forename: Kunpeng
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Keyou
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.forename: Xiaoqing
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Lu
authors.forename: Yongcai
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Qiu
authors.forename: Zhike
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.forename: Jianwei
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.forename: Feng
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Yan
authors.forename: Wenyue
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.forename: Shihe
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Yang