Graphene application as a counter electrode material for dye-sensitized solar cell

A well dispersed thin film of graphene on fluorine doped tin oxide (FTO) substrate was obtained by introducing polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP) as a wrapping agent for dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). Wrapping of graphene by PVP was confirmed by the formation of ester bonds (COOC), resulting in a highly packed uniform graphene thin film on FTO. The DSSCs fabricated with graphenePVP counter electrode demonstrated a reasonably high overall conversion efficiency of 3.01% with high short current density (J _SC) of 11.16 mA/cm, open circuit voltage (V _OC) of 0.726 V and fill factor of 0.37. This might result from the low charge transfer resistance and high redox current density due to the high electrocatalytic activity.