The Synthesis and Characterization of ZnO or Natural Dyes for DyeSensitized Solar Cells - Abstract
The ZnO/Natural Dyes had been successfully synthesized as Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells (DSSC). The natural dyes were extracted from tamarillo, red dragon fruit, red spinach, boat lily flower, and purple hibiscus flower. Preparation of ZnO thin films were carried out on an indium thin oxide (ITO) glass substrate using sol-gel method. The ZnO thin films were characterized by XRD and UV-Vis. The ZnO/natural dyes thin films were formed by dipping the ZnO thin film into natural dye solutions with the ZnO thin films facing up for 24 hours to let the dyes adsorbed by the film. DSSC efficiencies were measured by a simple circuit that consists of DSSC, multimeter both analog and digital. The results show that the ZnO crystal structure was of wurtzite hexagonal shape with size of 27.3 nm, and the band gap was 3.25 eV. The maximum efficiency of DSSC was of purple hibiscus flower which was 0.10017 %.