Plasmon-enhanced dye-sensitized solar cells through porphyrin-silver nanoparticle hybrid structures: Experimental and computational studies

Abstract

Surface plasmon resonance of silver nanoparticles (Ag NPs) was used to improve light absorption of porphyrins in plasmon-enhanced porphyrin-sensitized solar cells (PSSCs). Porphyrins with different substituents consisting -H, -Me, -MeO, -F, -Cl, -Br, -CO2H, -SO3H, -NO2, and -NH2 were used to study the effect of the interactions between photoactive dye molecules and plasmonic Ag NPs on the performance of PSSCs. The obtained results revealed that zinc tetra(4-carboxyphenyl)porphyrin and zinc tetra(4-aminophenyl)porphyrin have made the biggest impact on the performance of plasmon-enhanced PSSCs. Computational studies were done to study the electronic properties of porphyrin molecules with electron-withdrawing and electron-donating substituents interacted with Ag NPs. The theoretical studies confirmed that the electronic nature of substituents of porphyrins has a considerable effect on the electronic properties of porphyrin-AgNPs systems. In continue, Ag@ZIF-8 coreshell NPs were prepared to overcome the challenge of corrosion of Ag plasmonic nanoparticles. The results showed that using porphyrin-Ag@ZIF-8 systems, in many cases, the performance of PSSCs is increased relative to corresponding porphyrins but is decreased relative to porphyrin-AgNPs systems.