A facile strategy for preparation and application of squaraine nanometer hybrids with broad band absorption

Abstract Organic materials are receiving more attention in the solar cell due to their better solution process, controllable synthesis, tunable chemical and physical properties. However, the focus problem of compatibility and aggregation is to be solved urgently in organic materials, which inevitably limits them widely application. To this end, an inorganic–organic hybrid materials with wide-band absorption is designed and prepared, that incorporates octavinyl-polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane with 6-bromoquanaldine to produce H1, then reacts with squaric acid to design H2, which efficiently avoids the fluorescence quenching due to the steric hindrance. The electrochemical results shows that the energy level of H2 is match well with the commercial dye N719. Hence it shows a better photovoltaic performance based on dye-sensitized solar cell, along with power conversion efficiency up to 7.73% when it is co-sensitized with N719. The hybrid system exhibits good performances in solar cell and long-term stability.