Triphenylamine-based organic sensitizers with π-spacer structural engineering for dye-sensitized solar cells: Synthesis, theoretical calculations, molecular spectroscopy and structure-property-performance relationships

The heteroaromatic units play a key role in the D-π-A organic sensitizers for dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs), not only as π-spacers for tuning the optical properties and energy levels, but also as π-bridges for efficient electron transfer from donor to acceptor unit. The enhancement of π-spacer donating and accepting abilities is one of essential requirements to improve the molar absorption coefficient and red-shift the absorption band in...