title: In Situ Gelation of Poly(vinylidene fluoride) Nanospheres for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells: The Analysis on the Efficiency Enhancement upon Gelation.
abstract: The in situ gelation that utilizes the dissolution of polymers inside the cell is allowed high concentration polymer gel without concerns regarding high viscous electrolyte incorporation into the cell as in the conventional approach. We demonstrate the in situ gelation of polymer composite electrolytes using poly(vinylidene fluoride) nanospheres (PVdF NSs). The PVdF NSs were synthesized by high pressure emulsion polymerization using gaseous vinylidene fluoride monomers. Compared to the liquid electrolyte (LE) DSCs without PVdF gelation, the PVdF polymer gel electrolyte (PGE) DSCs displayed higher η than the LE DSCs; specifically, the 10 wt % PVdF PGE DSCs display 8.1% of the η, while the LE DSCs only display 6.5%. We characterized the effect of PVdF PGE on the photovoltaic parameters in detail. We also compared the long-term stability of DSCs containing LE and PVdF PGE. The DSCs with PVdF PGE exhibited high stability compared to the LE DSCs, similar to a conventional PGE system. We believe that this facile in situ gelation approach could be utilized for not only the practical application of polymer gel electrolytes DSCs but also for various energy-storage devices.
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Sogang University , 1 Sinsu-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul 121-742, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Su-Jin
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Ha
authors.affiliation: Center for Interface Materials and Chemical Engineering, Korea Research Institute of Chemistry Technology , 141 Gajeong-Ro, Daejeon 305-600, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Sang Goo
authors.initials: SG
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Center for Interface Materials and Chemical Engineering, Korea Research Institute of Chemistry Technology , 141 Gajeong-Ro, Daejeon 305-600, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jong-Wook
authors.initials: JW
authors.lastname: Ha
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Sogang University , 1 Sinsu-dong, Mapo-gu, Seoul 121-742, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Jun Hyuk
authors.initials: JH
authors.lastname: Moon