Natural Dye Extracted from Areca catechu Fruits as a New Sensitiser for Dye-sensitised Solar Cell Fabrication: Optimisation using D-Optimal Design

This study investigated the effect of different organic solvents, temperatures and pH levels for dye extraction from Areca catechu. The optimum conditions for the maximum yield of extracted natural dye were further determined using D-optimal design. The extracted dye at optimum conditions was used together with TiO2 as photosensitiser and the performance of dye-sensitised solar cell (DSSC) was further investigated. Analysis of variance ANOVA results showed that all factors significantly affect dye extraction. The optimum conditions of dye extraction were at 80 °C, pH 10 and ethanol as extraction solvent. The validation experimental at the optimum conditions showed the absorbance of the extracted dye was 1.832 with an error of less than 5%. The DSSC performance showed high energy conversion efficiency of 0.38% and the fill factor of 62.9%.