Application of gallium doped zinc oxide in dye sensitized solar cells

In this study, we investigated the effect of doping zinc oxide (ZnO) microrods on fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) conductive glass without seed layer and its characteristics at the photo electrode of dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC). Octadecyltrimethoxysilane (ODS; CH 3 (CH 2 ) 17 Si(OCH 3 ) 3 ) deposited on the substrate form a self-assembled monolayer by to enhance the following growth of ZnO microrods. 0.03M of zinc nitrate hexahydrate (Zn(NO 3 ) 2 ·6H 2 O) and 0.03 M hexamethylene tetramine (C 6 H 12 N 4 , HMT) were the main reaction materials in the hydrothermal method. In this experiment, the ZnO mircorods was doped with gallium, using the gallium nitrate (Ga(NO 3 ) 3 ) of 0.15 to 0.60 mM. The ZnO microrods applied for DSSCs analyzed by FE-SEM, UV-Vis spectra and I–V curves.