title: Highly efficient plastic crystal ionic conductors for solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells.
abstract: We have developed highly efficient, ambient temperature, solid-state ionic conductors (SSICs) for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) by doping a molecular plastic crystal, succinonitrile (SN), with trialkyl-substituted imidazolium iodide salts. High performance SSICs with enhanced ionic conductivity (2-4 mScm⁻¹) were obtained. High performance solid-state DSSCs with power conversion efficiency of 7.8% were fabricated using our SSICs combined with unique hierarchically nanostructured TiO₂ sphere (TiO₂-SP) photoelectrodes; these electrodes have significant macroporosity, which assists penetration of the solid electrolyte into the electrode. The performance of our solid-state DSSCs is, to the best of our knowledge, the highest reported thus far for cells using plastic crystal-based SSICs, and is comparable to that of the state-of-the-art DSSCs which use ionic liquid type electrolytes. This report provides a logical strategy for the development of efficient plastic crystal-based SSICs for DSSCs and other electrochemical devices.
authors.affiliation: 1] Department of Chemistry, Yonsei University, Seoul 120-749, Korea [2] Optoelectronic Materials Lab, Korea Institute of Science and Technology, Seoul 136-791, Korea.
authors.forename: Daesub
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Hwang
authors.affiliation: Optoelectronic Materials Lab, Korea Institute of Science and Technology, Seoul 136-791, Korea.
authors.forename: Dong Young
authors.initials: DY
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Optoelectronic Materials Lab, Korea Institute of Science and Technology, Seoul 136-791, Korea.
authors.forename: Seong Mu
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Jo
authors.affiliation: Australian Centre for Electromaterials Science, School of Chemistry, Monash University, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia.
authors.forename: Vanessa
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Armel
authors.affiliation: Australian Centre for Electromaterials Science, School of Chemistry, Monash University, Clayton, VIC 3800, Australia.
authors.forename: Douglas R
authors.initials: DR
authors.lastname: MacFarlane
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Yonsei University, Seoul 120-749, Korea.
authors.forename: Dongho
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Kim
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemistry, Kookmin University, Seoul 136-702, Korea.
authors.forename: Sung-Yeon
authors.initials: SY
authors.lastname: Jang