Design of Supramolecular Electrolytes for Solid State Dye-sensitized Solar Cells

고체형 염료감응 태양전지용 초분자 전해질 개발

Solid-state dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have been constructed employing supramolecular electrolytes with multiple hydrogen bonding. A supramolecule was facilely synthesized by one-pot reaction between the amines of methyl isocytosine (MIC) and the epoxy groups of poly(ethylene glycol diglycidyl ether) (PEGDGE) to produce quadruple hydrogen bonding units. Hydrogen bonding interactions and dissolution behavior of salt in supramolecular electrolytes are investigated. The ionic conductivity of the supramolecular electrolytes with ionic liquid, i.e. 1-methyl-3-propylimidazolium iodide (MPII) reaches $8.5{\times}10^{-5}$ S/cm at room temperature, which is higher than that with metal salt (KI). A worm-like morphology is observed in the FE-SEM micrographs of $TiO_2$ nanoporous layer, due to the connection of $TiO_2$ nanoparticles resulting from adequate coating by electrolytes. DSSCs employing the supramolecular electrolytes with MPII and KI exhibit an energy conversion efficiency of 2.5 % and 0.5 %, respectively, at 100 $mW/cm^2$, indicating the importance of the cation of salt. Solar cell performances were further improved up to 3.7 % upon introduction of poly(ethylene glycol dimethyl ether) (PEGDME) with 500 g/mol.