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Photo-driven water splitting photoelectrochemical cells by tandem organic dye sensitized solar cells with I−/I3− as redox mediator

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Abstract

Dye-sensitized photoelectrochemical tandem cells have shown the promise for light driven hydrogen production from water owing to the low cost, wide absorption spectra in the visible region and ease to process of their constitutive photoelectrode materials. However, most photo-driven water splitting photoelectrochemical cells driven by organic dye sensitized solar cells exhibit unsatisfactory hydrogen evolution rate, primarily attributed to their poor light capturing ability and low photocurrent performance. Here we present the construction of a tandem system consisting of an organic blue-colored S5 sensitizer-based dye-sensitized photoelectrochemical cell (DSPEC) wired in series with three spectral-complemental dyes BTA-2, APP-3 and APP-1 sensitizers-based dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC), respectively. The two spectral-complemental chromophores were used in DSC and DSPEC to ensure that the full solar spectrum could be absorbed as much as possible. The results showed that the photocurrent of tandem device was closely related to the open-circuit voltage (Voc) of sensitized DSC, in which the tandem configuration consisting of S5 based DSPEC and BTA-2 based DSC gave the best photocurrent. On this basis, tandem device with the only light energy and no external applied electrical bias was further constructed of BTA-2 based 2-junction DSC and S5 based DSPEC and obtained a photocurrent of 500 µA cm−2 for hydrogen generation. Furthermore, I−/I3− was used as a redox couple between dye regeneration and O2 production on the surface of Pt-IrO2/WO3. The strategy opens up the application of pure organic dyes in DSC/DSPEC tandem device.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (21971064, 21421004, 21772040, 21572062), Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Major Project (2018SHZDZX03), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (50321101918001, 222201717003) and the Programme of Introducing Talents of Discipline to Universities (B16017). The authors thank Research Center of Analysis and Test of East China University of Science and Technology for the help on the characterization.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory for Advanced Material, Feringa Nobel Prize Scientist Joint Research Center and School of Chemistry and Molecular Engineering, East China University of Science and Technology, Shanghai, 200237, China

    Shicong Zhang, Haonan Ye, Haoran Ding, Fengtao Yu & Jianli Hua

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  1. Shicong Zhang
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  2. Haonan Ye
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  3. Haoran Ding
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  4. Fengtao Yu
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  5. Jianli Hua
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Correspondence to Jianli Hua.

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11426_2019_9596_MOESM1_ESM.pdf

Photo-driven water splitting photoelectrochemical cells by tandem organic dye sensitized solar cells with I−/I3− as redox mediator

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Zhang, S., Ye, H., Ding, H. et al. Photo-driven water splitting photoelectrochemical cells by tandem organic dye sensitized solar cells with I−/I3− as redox mediator. Sci. China Chem. 63, 228–236 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11426-019-9596-7

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