α-Fe2O3 hollow meso-microspheres grown on graphene sheets function as a promising counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cells

Guomin Zhao; Guangji Xu; Shuang Jin

doi:10.1039/c9ra02586c

α-Fe₂O₃ hollow meso-microspheres grown on graphene sheets function as a promising counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cells

RSC Adv. 2019 Aug 5;9(42):24164-24170. doi: 10.1039/c9ra02586c. eCollection 2019 Aug 2.

Authors

Guomin Zhao¹, Guangji Xu¹, Shuang Jin¹

Affiliation

¹ School of Energy and Safety Engineering, Tianjin Chengjian University Tianjin 300384 China guominzhao@163.com.

Abstract

Although nanoparticles, nanorods, and nanosheets of α-Fe₂O₃ on graphene sheets have been synthesized, it remains a challenge to grow 3D α-Fe₂O₃ nanomaterials with more sophisticated compositions and structures on the graphene sheets. Herein, we demonstrate a facile solvothermal route under controlled conditions to successfully fabricate 3D α-Fe₂O₃ hollow meso-microspheres on the graphene sheets (α-Fe₂O₃/RGO HMM). Attributed to the combination of the catalytic features of α-Fe₂O₃ hollow meso-microspheres and the high conductivity of graphene, α-Fe₂O₃/RGO HMM exhibited promising electrocatalytic performance as a counter electrode in dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). The DSSCs fabricated with α-Fe₂O₃ HMM displayed high power conversion efficiency of 7.28%, which is comparable with that of Pt (7.71%).