Enhanced Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells Performance through Novel Core-shell Structure of Gold Nanoparticles and Nano-Silica Extracted from Lapindo Mud Vulcano

Abstract

Addition of nanoparticles as light scattering and plasmonic material in the photoanodes of dye-sensitized solar cells is known to enhance photovoltaic performance. SiO2 addition in DSSC TiO2-based can be used as partial barrier of charge recombination and extending light path due to difference of refractive index of SiO2 and TiO2. Meanwhile, noble metal nanoparticles is known for their localized surface plasmon resonance(LSPR), that describe to have strong light scattering effect and local field enhancement. In this work, nanoparticles core-shell structure using addition SiO2 extracted from Lapindo mud vulcano and gold nanoparticles were used. The structure used in this work is nanoparticles core-shell structure of SiO2@TiO2@Au and TiO2@SiO2@Au. The DSSC using TiO2/SiO2@TiO2@Au nanoparticlesas photoanode have enhanced power conversion efficiency about 1.9times higher than the DSSC using solely TiO2 as photoanodes due to the direct contact between Au and TiO2.