Surface Plasmon Resonance Enhancement of PbS Quantum Dot-Sensitized Solar Cells

Lead sulfide (PbS)-sensitized quantum dot solar cells (QDSC) were fabricated using TiO2 and TiO2–Au plasmonic nanocomposite films by successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction (SILAR) method. The average size of gold nanoparticles (GNPs) used for fabricating nanocomposite films was ~ 15 nm. Thin plasmonic QDSC, with a film thickness of 10 µm, showed an increase of ~ 11% in photocurrent and ~ 6% in overall energy conversion efficiency compared to the device without GNPs. The improved performance of QDSCs is attributed to the increased absorption due to the plasmonic near-field effects of the incorporated GNPs. High-efficiency PbS/CdS-co-sensitized thick cells with 16 µm bilayer TiO2 also showed improvement in photocurrent and efficiency. The results show that the plasmonic-enhanced absorption can be used to augment efficiency of QDSC devices in much the same fashion as that of dye-sensitized solar cells.