A Facile and Rapid Process to Fabricate Platinum Counter Electrode in Dye-Sensitized Solar Cell Using Nanosecond Pulsed Laser Sintering at Room Temperature

Abstract

To fabricate the platinum (Pt) counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), rapid and low sintering process was carried out using nanosecond pulsed laser sintering (LS) method based on third harmonic (355 nm) of an Nd:YAG laser at room temperature. The surface morphology of LS-Pt on fluorine-doped tin oxide (FTO) electrode showed thin and compact structure, consisting of particles size of similar to 10-30 nm and thickness of below 30 nm. The DSSCs with the LS-Pt/FTO counter electrodes displayed the power conversion efficiency of 4.4% with short-circuit current = 9.07 mA/cm(2), open-circuit voltage = 0.79 V and fill factor = 61.3.