Enhanced DSSC performance with tri-pyridine-ruthenium heteropolytungstate

In this paper, we load TiO2 on the surface of the tri-pyridine-ruthenium heteropolytungstate [Ru(bipy)(3)](2)[SiW12O40]center dot 2C(2)H(5)OH center dot 8H(2)O (1), which is mixed with P25 powder to get photoanode material and then adsorb N719 dyes to assemble a dye-sensitized solar cell. It is important that the performance of the DSSCs with 1-doped TiO2 (1 @ TiO2) is superior to ones with H4SiW12O40-doped TiO2 ({SiW12) @ TiO2), although their photoelectric conversion efficiencies are both higher than pure P25-based cells. The investigation of the EIS shows that 1 @ TiO2 can restrain charge recombination and doping the transition metal ruthenium improves the performance of the cell. The photovoltaic performance of the cell is enhanced and the short-circuit photocurrent density (J(sc)) is as high as 16.272 mA cm(-2), which is 20.4% higher than pure P25-based cells and 4.4% higher than the {SiW12} @ TiO2-based cells under simulated AM 1.5 irradiation. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.