Synthesis of Nanorods Titanium Dioxide via Anodic Alumina Membrane Template and their Applications in Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells

Abstract

Titanium dioxide (TiO2) nanorods have been successfully synthesized through sol- gel method via Anodic Alumina Membrane (AAM) as template. AAM template was removed using 6 M NaOH solution to obtain TiO2 nanorods only. Then TiO2 nanorods were annealed at 400°C for 2 h. Phase TiO2 nanorods were characterized using X-Ray Diffraction (XRD) and morphology of TiO2 nanorods were observed using Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM). In addition, the I-V meter was used to determine the DSSC efficiency. The XRD patterns showed that all peaks of synthesized-TiO2 indicated anatase phase. AFM images confirmed that TiO2 nanorods have diameters in range 18-30 nm. TiO2 nanorods were mixed with TiO2 nanoparticles having 21 nm in size then it was applied in the DSSC with p-carotene from carrot as dye. The efficiency of DSSC using TiO2 mixed-nanorods and nanoparticles increase about 154.20% compare to using TiO2 nanoparticles only. It is considered that TiO2 nanorod structures can be effective in photon trapping thus many photon interact to dyes to produce many excited-electrons.