The power-conversion efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) is boosted with a new photosensitizing dye formulated at École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland.

The MS5 sensitizer can be deployed as a single dye together with a copper electrolyte to produce an open-3D structural representation of MS5 and photograph of DSSCs. Source: Marko Stojanovic and Dan Zhang/École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausannecircuit voltage, or the maximum voltage of a solar cell in full sunlight, of 1.24 V. The new dye can also function as a co-sensitizer along with a commercial dye, offering a wider spectral response to achieve a power conversion efficiency of 13.5%. A co-sensitized solar cell with an active area of 2.8 cm² demonstrated a record conversion efficiency of 34.5% under ambient light, rendering it applicable as an ambient light harvesting energy source for low power electronics.

The new dye absorbs photons from the blue and yellow domain of the solar spectrum and enhances DSSC voltage output by retarding the recombination of charge carriers generated by light. The MS5 dye is simple to synthesize up to the gram scale using a one-step procedure described in Nature Communications.