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The photovoltaic characteristics (short circuit current, open circuit voltage, fill factor, and photon-to-electron conversion efficiency) and electrochemical impedance measurements of normal and inverse-opal dye-sensitized electrodes were carried out in a transparent electrolyte (0.6 M triethhanolamine/0.5 M lithium perchlorate in acetonitrile) using three different methods; electrophoretic deposition, TiCl4 coating, and liquid-phase deposition (LPD). X-ray diffraction (XRD) analysis revealed that each electrode was composed of anatase TiO2. The impedance elements discussed previously were substrate resistance (R0), interface resistance at indium tin oxide (ITO)/titanium oxide (TiO2) (R1), contact resistance between TiO2 particles (R2), interface resistance at TiO2/dye/electrolyte and counter electrode/electrolyte (R3), and diffusion resistance of the electrolyte (R4). The internal resistances of inverse opal electrodes were varied with the preparation methods, especially in relation to the contact resistance between R2 and R3. The electrode prepared by LPD exhibited the smallest internal resistances and the highest photon-to-electron conversion efficiency among the three methods.
self-assembly; photonic crystal; colloidal crystal; self-assembled particle structure; photoelectrode
The authors thank Mr. Yohey Shibuya, Ms. Miho Kawai and Mr. Nobuhisa Hikichi for their valuable help. This work was partially supported by The Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science
and Technology (21750024), and Nihon University Strategic Projects for Academic Research (Nanotechnology Excellence).
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