Zhaoyang Yao

Donor/Acceptor Indenoperylene Dye for Highly Efficient Organic Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

An N-annulated indenoperylene electron-donor decorated with photochemically inactive segments is synthesized and further conjugated via triple bond with electron-acceptor benzothiadiazolylbenzoic acid for a metal-free donor/acceptor dye. Without use of any coadsorbate, the judiciously tailored indenoperylene dye achieves a high-power conversion efficiency of 12.5% under irradiance of 100 mW cm(-2) AM1.5G sunlight.

A Metal‐Free N‐Annulated Thienocyclopentaperylene Dye: Power Conversion Efficiency of 12 % for Dye‐Sensitized Solar Cells

Reported are two highly efficient metal-free perylene dyes featuring N-annulated thienobenzoperylene (NTBP) and N-annulated thienocyclopentaperylene (NTCP), which are coplanar polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons. Without the use of any coadsorbate, the metal-free organic dye derived from the NTCP segment was used for a dye-sensitized solar cell which attained a power conversion efficiency of 12% under an irradiance of 100 mW cm(-2), simulated air mass global (AM1.5G) sunlight.

Dithienopicenocarbazole as the kernel module of low-energy-gap organic dyes for efficient conversion of sunlight to electricity

An electron-donor with a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon dithieno[2′,3′:2,3;3′′,2′′:10,11]piceno[1,14,13,12-bcdefgh]carbazole (DTPC) as the primary skeleton and also decorated with multiple solubilizing groups is coupled to 4-(benzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazol-4-ylethynyl)benzoic acid, for a metal-free organic dye (C281). The near-infrared photosensitizing dye exhibits over 80% external quantum efficiency in a broad spectral range from 480 nm to 735 nm, and a high power conversion efficiency of 13.0% under irradiance of simulated AM 1.5G sunlight (100 mW cm−2).

A structurally simple perylene dye with ethynylbenzothiadiazole-benzoic acid as the electron acceptor achieves an over 10% power conversion efficiency

On the basis of the N-annulated perylene electron donor and the ethynylbenzothiadiazole-benzoic acid electron acceptor, we herein report on synthesizing a structurally simple donor–acceptor (D–A) perylene dye C272. Without the use of any coadsorbate, we have achieved an impressive power conversion efficiency of 10.4% at air mass global (AM1.5G) conditions, which is comparable to that of the well-known zinc porphyrin dye YD2-o-C8.

Conjugated linker correlated energetics and kinetics in dithienopyrrole dye-sensitized solar cells

We report two triarylamine-cyanoacrylic acid based push–pull dyes C252 and C253 featuring the π-conjugated linkers of 2,6-di(thiophen-2-yl)-4H-dithieno[3,2-b:2′,3′-d]pyrrole and 4H,4′H-2,2′-bidithieno[3,2-b:2′,3′-d]pyrrole, respectively. Benefitting from an improved coplanarity of the conjugated units, the C253 dye displays a red-shifted absorption peak and an enhanced maximum molar absorption coefficient in comparison with C252. However, this pattern of conjugated linker alternation is associated with an 80 mV negative shift of the ground-state oxidation potential, which dominates an almost 5 times reduced rate of hole injection from the oxidized state of C253 to the divalent tris(2,2′-bipyridine)cobalt (Co-bpy) cation in the redox electrolyte, resulting in a considerably poor net charge separation yield. On the other side, a dye-sensitized solar cell employing the C252 photosensitizer and the Co-bpy electrolyte exhibits a good power conversion efficiency of 9.5% measured under the 100 mW cm−2 simulated AM1.5 sunlight. The dissimilarity of cell photovoltage is scrutinized by evaluating the shift of the titania conduction band edge and the variation of interfacial charge recombination kinetics, the latter of which presents a clear correlation with dye coating thickness on titania derived from X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy measurements. Our work has underlined the important energetic and kinetic interplays which should be seriously considered in the further optimization of active components in dye-sensitized solar cells.

A Systematic Study on the Influence of Electron-Acceptors in Phenanthrocarbazole Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

In this work, by conjugating 2-cyanoacrylic acid (CA), 4-(benzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazol-7-yl)benzoic acid (BTBA), 4-(7-ethynylbenzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazol-4-yl)benzoic acid (EBTBA), and 4-((7-ethynylbenzo[c][1,2,5]thiadiazol-4-yl)ethynyl)benzoic acid (EBTEBA) to a binary electron-donor diphenylamine-phenanthrocarbazole (DPA-PC), we systematically investigate the impacts of electron-acceptors upon energy level, energy gap, light-harvesting ability, photovoltaic parameter, and cell stability of donor-acceptor dyes in photoelectrochemical cells. In conjunction with an ionic liquid composite electrolyte, the DPA-PC dye with EBTEBA as electron-acceptor yields a high power conversion efficiency of 8% and an outstanding stability after a 1000 h aging test under the soaking of full sunlight at 60 °C in a dye-sensitized solar cell. Femtosecond fluorescence up-conversion measurements have suggested that energy relaxation and electron injection both occur to dye molecules in the nonequilibrium excited states. Moreover, the time constants of injecting electrons from dye molecules in the excited states to titania are very dispersive for over 1 order of magnitude, mainly owing to the broad energy distribution of excited states.

Electron-acceptor-dependent light absorption, excited-state relaxation, and charge generation in triphenylamine dye-sensitized solar cells.

By choosing a simple triphenylamine electron donor, we herein compare the influence of electron acceptors benzothiadiazole benzoic acid (BTBA) and cyanoacrylic acid (CA), on energy levels, light absorption, and dynamics of excited-state evolution and electron injection. DFT and time-dependent DFT calculations disclosed remarkable intramolecular conformational changes for the excited states of these two donor-acceptor dyes. Photoinduced dihedral angle variation occurs to the triphenylamine unit in the CA dye and backbone planarization happens to conjugated aromatic blocks in the BTBA dye. Femtosecond spectroscopic measurements suggested the crucial role of having a long excited-state lifetime in maintaining a high electron-injection yield because a reduced driving force for a low energy-gap dye can result in slower electron-injection dynamics.