Semiconductor Sensitized Solar Cells Based on BiVO4-Sensitized Mesoporous SnO2 Photoanodes

Low cost, stable and visible-light-responsive bismuth vanadate (BiVO4) was used as the light absorbing material to fabricate a low bandgap oxide solar cell on mesoporous SnO2 photoanode. BiVO4 nanoparticles were grown on the mesoporous SnO2 films employing successive ionic layer adsorption and reaction process. The optimized BiVO4 solar cell shows an incident photon to current conversion efficiency of more than 60% at a wide range of visible region (350 nm-450 nm), leading to a power conversion efficiency of 0.56% at AM1.5, 100 mW x cm(-2). This result provides important insights into the low cost and robust oxide solar cells.