Dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) became one of the most important topics in the research field focusing on clean and renewable energy sources. The detailed understanding of photoinduced excitation energy motion and heterogeneous electron transfer (ET) would help to improve the photovoltaic efficiency of DSSCs. Of particular interest are potential enhancement effects provided by plasmon excitations of a metal nano-particle (MNP) placed near the sensitizer molecule attached to a semiconductor surface (for example [1]). Using an earlier developed parametrized model of heterogeneous ET from a perylene derivative into the conduction band continuum of TiO2[2,3] the presented theory accounts for plasmon enhanced dye absorption, energy exchange between the dye and the MNP and fast plasmon decay in the MNP. This is achieved by formulating the used density matrix theory in the tight-binding states of the TiO2 lattice and by accounting for the coupling to the MNP in the framework of an image charge approximation. The obtained enhancement of the photoinduced charge injection efficiency which reaches more than three orders of magnitude is discussed in different respects: (1) dependency on the geometry of the dye-MNP complex at the TiO2 surface, (2) effect of the mutual position of energy levels of the dye and the MNP excitations (strength of charge injection), (3) influence of the laser pulse parameters of optical excitation on the enhancement.[1] M. D. Brown, T. Suteewong, R. S. S. Kumar,V. D. Innocenzo, A. Petrozza, M. M. Lee, U. Wiesner, and H. J. Snaith, Nano Lett. 11,438 (2011)[2] L. Wang, R. Ernstorfer, F. Willig and V. May, J. Phys. Chem. B 109, 9589 (2005)[3] L. Wang, V. May, R. Ernstorfer, J. Gundlach and F. Willig,in 'Analysis and Control of Ultrafast Photoinduced Reactions',O. K�hn and L. W�ste (eds.), Springer Series in Chemical Physics Vol. 87 (Springer-Verlag, 2007), p. 437.

Metal nanoparticle affected photoinduced heterogeneous electron transfer

246th National Meeting (2013)

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