1. State Key Laboratory of New Ceramics and Fine Processing, Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, 100084, China 2. College of Chemical Engineering, Qinghai University, Xining, 810016, China
Abstract:
Anatase titanium dioxide nanowire arrays were prepared by hydrothermally oxidizing titanium foils in aqueous alkali and transferred onto fluorinated tin oxide (FTO) glass for use as the photoanodes of front side illuminated dye-sensitized solar cells (DSCs). Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy (EIS) measurement was applied to compare the electron transport and recombination properties of DSCs using TiO2 nanowire films and TiO2 nanoparticle films as photoanodes. It was found that the nanowire array films possess smaller electron transport resistance (Rt) and larger electron diffusion length (Le) in the photoanodes, suggesting that the nanowire arrays can enhance the electron transport rate and have a potential to improve the charge collection efficiency of DSCs.