• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.34 no.7
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• pp.2093-2098
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• 2013

Density functional theory (DFT) was used to determine the ground state geometries of indigo and new design dyes (IM-Dye-1 IM-Dye-2 and IM-Dye-3). The time dependant density functional theory (TDDFT) was used to calculate the excitation energies. All the calculations were performed in both gas and solvent phase. The LUMO energies of all the dyes were above the conduction band of $TiO_2$, while the HOMOs were below the redox couple (except IM-Dye-3). The HOMO-LUMO energy gaps of new design dyes were smaller as compared to indigo. All new design dyes were strongly red shifted as compared to indigo. The improved light harvesting efficiency (LHE) and free energy change of electron injection ${\Delta}G^{inject}$ of new designed sensitizers revealed that these materials would be excellent sensitizers. The broken coplanarity between the benzene near anchoring group having LUMO and the last benzene attached to TPA unit in all new design dyes consequently would hamper the recombination reaction. This theoretical designing will the pave way for experimentalists to synthesize the efficient sensitizers for solar cells.

• Current Photovoltaic Research
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• v.2 no.1
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• pp.18-27
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• 2014

Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), developed two decades ago, are considered to be an attractive technology among various photovoltaic devices because of their low cost, accessible dye chemistry, ease of fabrication, high power conversion efficiency, and environmentally friendly nature. A typical DSSCs consists of a dye-coated $TiO_2$ photoanode, a redox electrolyte, and a platinum (Pt)-coated fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) counter electrode. Among them, redox electrolytes have proven to be extremely important in improving the performance of DSSCs. Due to many drawbacks of iodide electrolytes, many research groups have paid more attention to seeking other alternative electrolyte systems. With regard to this, one-electron outer sphere redox shuttles based on cobalt complexes have shown promising results: In 2014, porphyrin dye (SM315) with the cobalt (II/III) redox couple exhibited a power conversion efficiency of 13% in DSSCs. In this review, we will provide an overview and perspectives of cobalt redox electrolytes in DSSCs.

• Journal of the Korean Institute of Electrical and Electronic Material Engineers
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• v.28 no.11
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• pp.731-736
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• 2015

Rhodamine B (RhB) was utilized as a dye sensitizer for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) and its photovoltaic property was examined under the illumination of AM 1.5 G, $100mWcm^{-2}$. DSSCs based on RhB exhibited typical photovoltaic properties with an open-circuit voltage ($V_{OC}$) of 0.34 V, a short-circuit current ($J_{SC}$) of $1.55mA{\cdot}cm^{-2}$, a fill factor (FF) of 50%, and a conversion efficiency (PCE) of 0.26%. In order to further improve the photovoltaic properties of RhB-based DSSCs, the effect of (i) incorporating a strong electron-donating NCS unit into the RhB molecular backbone, (ii) combining a bis-negatively charged zinc complex anion ($Zn-dmit_2$, dmit=di-mercapto-dithiol-thione) with the amine cation of RhB, (iii) co-adsorbing RhB dyes with chenodeoxycholic acid (CDCA) molecules onto porous $TiO_2$ electrodes, was investigated and discussed.

• Carbon letters
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• v.9 no.2
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• pp.131-136
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• 2008

In order to investigate the effect of doping C, N, B and F elements on $TiO_2$ for reducing the band gap, the heat treatment of $TiO_2$ was carried out with tetraethylammonium tetrafluoroborate. Through XRD and XPS analysis, the C, N, B and F doped anatase $TiO_2$ was confirmed. According to the increase of temperature during treatment, the particle size was increased due to aggregation of $TiO_2$ with elements (B, C, N and F). To investigate the capacity of photocatalyst for degradation of dye under solar light, the degradation of acridine orange and methylene blue was conducted. The degradation of dyes was carried out successfully under solar light indicating the effect of doping elements (B, C, N and F) on $TiO_2$ for reducing the band gap effectively.

• Rapid Communication in Photoscience
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• v.1 no.2
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• pp.35-37
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• 2012

Photoinduced electron-transfer process of 1,8-naphthalimide-linker-trimethylsilane (NI-O3-TMS, O3 = 3,6,9-trioxaundecyl) and NI-O3 has been investigated using the transient absorption measurements in $CH_3CN$ and $CH_3CN/H_2O$. The excitation of NI-O3-TMS in $CH_3CN$ produced the NI radical anion ($NI^{{\cdot}-}$) with a transient absorption band around 413 nm, via the intermolecular electron-transfer between NI moieties in the excited singlet state. In contrast, in a protic polar solvent mixture of $CH_3CN/H_2O$, a proton abstraction process occurred from $NI^{{\cdot}-}$ to generate the NI ketyl radical ($NIH^{\cdot}$), which showed a transient absorption band around 405 nm. The decay time constants of $NIH^{\cdot}$ were quite long compared to those of $NI^{{\cdot}-}$ in $CH_3CN$.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.31 no.11
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• pp.3272-3278
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• 2010

Synthesis and structural characterization of peripherally ferrocene-substituted zinc phthalocyanine (ZnPc-Fc) were carried out for efficient far-red/near-IR performance in dye-sensitized nanostructured $TiO_2$ solar cells. Incorporating ferrocene into phthalocyanine strongly improved the dye solubility in polar organic solvents, and reduced surface aggregation due to the steric effect of bulky ferrocene substituents. The involvement of electron transfer reaction pathways between ferrocene and phthalocyanine in ZnPc-Fc was evidenced by completely quenched fluorescence from S1 state (< 0.08% vs ZnPc). Strong absorption bands at 542 and 682 nm were observed in the transient absorption spectroscopy of ZnPc-Fc in DMSO, which was excited at a 670 nm laser pulse with a 15 ps full width at half maximum. Also, the excited state absorption signals at 450 - 600 and 750 - 850 nm appeared from the formation of charge separated state of phthalocyanine's anion. The lifetime of the charge separate state in ZnPc-Fc was determined to be $170{\pm}8$ ps, which was almost 17 times shorter than that of the ZnPc.

• Bulletin of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.35 no.4
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• pp.1165-1168
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• 2014

We prepared dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) with enhanced energy conversion efficiency using open-ended $TiO_2$ nanotube arrays with a $TiO_2$ scattering layer. As compared to closed-ended $TiO_2$ nanotube arrays, the energy conversion efficiency of the open-ended $TiO_2$ nanotube arrays was increased from 5.63% to 5.92%, which is an enhancement of 5.15%. With the $TiO_2$ scattering layer, the energy conversion efficiency was increased from 5.92% to 6.53%, which is an enhancement of 10.30%. After treating the open-ended $TiO_2$ nanotube arrays with $TiCl_4$, the energy conversion efficiency was increased from 6.53% to 6.89%, a 5.51% enhancement, which is attributed to improved light harvesting and increased dye adsorption.

• Applied Chemistry for Engineering
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• v.10 no.8
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• pp.1147-1154
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• 1999

We developed three-wavelength solar bank which is a very important part of the solar simulator with the commercial mercury lamps and projected halogen lamps. This was developed to satisfy simultaneously following three points: the ${\pm}10%$ uniformity of irradiance of the target area and irradiance in the each wave region and $1120W/m^2$ maximum irradiance of the solar in the summer. We used spectral radiance to determine the standard of the spectral irradiance and developed the perfect three-wavelength solar bank,considering of directionality, irradiance distance, interval both lamps, lamps combination and lamp numbers based on the measured spectral irradiance. To proof the capability of the three wavelength solar bank, We carefully analyzed color differences and heat transfer. As a result, we found that three wavelength solar bank was much better than commercial infrared lamp bank in terms of the color differences, heat transfer phenomena.

• Journal of the Korean Chemical Society
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• v.56 no.1
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• pp.159-163
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• 2012

• Journal of Electrochemical Science and Technology
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• v.4 no.4
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• pp.125-139
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• 2013

The electrical conductive polymers (ECPs) reported at my research group are introduced in this review, which works are started from the late Professor Su-Moon Park's pioneering research for polyaniline at the University of New Mexico. The electrochemical and spectroelectrochemical properties and their applications to sensor and energy conversion systems are briefly described. At first, the growth and degradation mechanism of polyaniline describes and we extend to polypyrrole, polyazulene, polydiaminonaphthalenes, and polyterthiophene derivatives. In addition, the preparation of monomer precursors having functional groups is briefly described that can give us many exceptional applications for several chemical reactions. We describe the application of these ECPs for the fabrication of chemical sensors, biosensors, biofuel cells, and solar cells.