A Review on the Applicability of Luminescent Phosphors and Effective Positioning in Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells for Enhanced Performance and Stability

The narrow range of solar light absorption facilitated by the photoactive organic dyes has been restricting the significant development, and large-scale applications of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSC). The major problem that limits the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of DSSC is the limitations of the organic dyes (light absorbers in DSSC) to absorb beyond the visible region of solar spectrum that resulting in lower PCE (& AP;13%) as compared with the commercialized technologies. Hence, the focus on developing efficient strategies to harvest the ultraviolet and infrared light regions of the solar spectrum and effective conversion into the absorption limit of dyes and thereby increasing the device performance and stability is the emerging technological development in DSSCs. Rare earth ion-doped upconversion (UC) and downconversion (DC) phosphors are the most promising solutions for the prevalent issues of the liquid junction solar cells. This review will focus on the emerging strategies for the PCE enhancement of DSSC with UC and DC materials. An exclusive review on the facile approach of simultaneous usage of both the UC and DC phosphors and the effective positioning of these spectral conversion phosphors, to achieve highly stable DSSCs with superior PCE is provided. A systematic summary of the applicability and multifunctional properties of spectral conversion phosphors on different regions of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) with suitable positioning, as well as the emerging trend of simultaneous usage of both the upconversion and downconversion phosphors in a single-junction DSSC architecture to realize the maximum possible efficiency and stability, is the main focus of this review.image & COPY; 2023 WILEY-VCH GmbH