A star-shaped sensitizer based on thienylenevinylene for dye-sensitized solar cells

A novel star-shaped dye based on highly conjugated oligothienylenevinylene (nTV) bearing pendant solubilizing hexyl chains and end-capped with three tetramethylammonium cyanoacetates as anchoring groups has been synthetized. Its photovoltaic performance, in mesoporous TiO2 dye-sensitized solar cell, has been tested under different experimental conditions. The best performances were obtained at longer adsorption times of 4 h using different electrolyte compositions, reaching up to 3.11% of efficiency.