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Improvement of electrical and photovoltaic properties of methyl red dye based photoelectrochemical cells in presence of single walled carbon nanotubes

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Abstract

In this work, we investigated the effect of single walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNT) on the electrical and photovoltaic properties of methyl red (MR) dye based photoelectrochemical cell (PEC). MR dye based PEC with LiClO4 as ion salt were fabricated with and without mixing SWCNT. The cells were characterized through electrical and optical measurements. The performance of the devices changed drastically in presence of SWCNT. The transition voltage and trap energy of the cells were estimated from the steady-state dark current voltage (I-V) analysis. The transition voltage and trap energy decreased for MR dye cell in presence of SWCNT. Open circuit voltage (V oc), short circuit current (J sc), fill factor (FF) and power conversion efficiency (η) increased due to the addition of SWCNT. Further measurement of the transient photocurrent showed that the growth and decay of photocurrent was quite faster in presence of SWCNT. The photocurrent decay with time was fitted for both the cells and found to follow a power law relation which indicates dispersive transport mechanism with exponential trap states distributed in between lowest unoccupied molecular orbital (LUMO) and highest occupied molecular orbital (HOMO) levels. Possible interpretation is done on the lowering of trap energy with the photocurrent. These results suggest that SWCNT lowers the trap energy of the cells by providing efficient percolation pathways for the conduction of charges. It is expected that due to lowering of trap energy the residing time of the free carriers within the traps decreases. In other words, it may also be said that the charge recombination decreases. These factors affect the overall conduction of charges and improve the electrical and photovoltaic properties.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Condensed Matter Physics Research Center, Department of Physics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, 700032, India

    Sujata Chakraborty & Nabin Baran Manik

Authors
  1. Sujata Chakraborty
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  2. Nabin Baran Manik
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Correspondence to Nabin Baran Manik.

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Sujata Chakraborty received her B.Sc. degree from the Department of Physics at Cotton College under Gauhati University, India in 2009 and obtained her M.Sc. degree from the same university in 2011. She is now a Ph.D. student at the Department of Physics, Jadavpur University. Her research interests include development and characterization of photovoltaic devices using semiconducting conjugated polymers and organic dyes.

Nabin Baran Manik is an associate professor in Department of Physics, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India. He received his Ph.D. degree from Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India, in 1998 and right after that he joined as lecturer in Physics Department of the same university. In 2004, he was awarded Better Opportunities for Young Scientists in Chosen Areas of Science and Technology (BOYSCAST) Fellowship of Department of Science and Technology (DST), Govt. of India and did his Post Doctoral work at Leibniz-Institut für Festkörper- und Werkstoffforschung (IFW), Dresden, Germany. He is working in the area of development of photovoltaic devices using semiconducting conjugated polymers and organic dyes, low temperature instrumentation, characterization of optoelectronics devices at low temperature. Several students have completed their Ph.D. under his supervision. Different research projects from different funding agencies were undertaken by him. He had also delivered invited talk in different national and international conference. He has different publications both at national and international journals some of which are available in his website: www.nbmanik.in.

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Chakraborty, S., Manik, N.B. Improvement of electrical and photovoltaic properties of methyl red dye based photoelectrochemical cells in presence of single walled carbon nanotubes. Front. Optoelectron. 8, 289–297 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12200-015-0527-6

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12200-015-0527-6

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