Phthalocyanine-silver nanoparticle structures for plasmon-enhanced dye-sensitized solar cells

Abstract The localized surface plasmon resonance of silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) was examined to improve the performance of phthalocyanine (MTXPc) in the plasmon-enhanced phthalocyanine-sensitized solar cells. When MTXPc dyes directly conjugated to Ag NPs (MTXPc-AgNPs) were used to sensitize solar cells, both of short-circuit current density (JSC) and open-circuit voltage (VOC) of phthalocyanine-sensitized solar cells were significantly increased. In the case of MTXPc conjugated to Ag@ZIF-8 (MTXPc-Ag@ZIF-8), slightly increasing in the JSC compared to alone MTXPc are observable but their VOC are significantly greater than alone MTXPc. Increasing in the JSC and VOC of the MTXPc-AgNPs and MTXPc-Ag@ZIF-8 lead to improve the performance of phthalocyanine in plasmon-enhanced phthalocyanine-sensitized solar cells compared to alone MTXPc. Also, the examination of the effect of the carboxyl- and sulfonyl-anchored dye (ZnTCPc-AgNPs and ZnTSPc-AgNPs, respectively) in conjunction with plasmonic NPs on the performance of DSSCs showed that ZnTCPc-AgNPs and ZnTSPc-AgNPs perform significantly better than their unsubstituted analogues. The studying the effect of the metal in the central cavity of phthalocyanine using zinc, manganese, iron, cobalt, and nickel showed that the metal in the central cavity of phthalocyanine has the critical role toward the photovoltaic performance of the plasmon-enhanced phthalocyanine-sensitized solar cells.