Carbon nanotube supported thiospinel quantum dots as counter electrodes for dye sensitized solar cells

Abstract

In the current study, sulfide based ternary and quaternary thiospinel nanocrystals were synthesized by using a simple hot injection method and used as catalyst instead of Pt in a DSSCs application for the first time. CuNiCoS4, CuCo5S8, and CuCo2S4 as thiospinel nanocrystals have been synthesized in crystalline structure, single phase, nearly stoichiometric, and having narrow size distribution below 10 nm. Comparative studies showed that, Carbon Nanotube (CNT)-CuCo2S4 based DSSCs yielded the most favorable results as a potential counter electrode showing very similar power conversion efficiency (eta = 4.99%) in comparison with Pt based DSSCs produced under identical conditions. Therefore, this study implies that the thiospinel nanocrystals and their CNT supported composites can be proposed as novel counter electrode materials for low-cost platinum-free solar cells.