Enhancement of Exciton Generation and Sustainability in Dye Sensitized Solar Cell with Photoanode of Nb/Nd Co-Doped TiO₂ Incorporated with Natural Dye Extracted from Pouteria campechiana Fruits

Abstract: For the first time, natural dye was extracted using ethanol from the fruits of Pouteria campechiana and used to soak the Nb/Nd co-doped TiO₂ coated FTO substrate which served as photoanode of dye sensitized solar cell. X-Ray diffraction, photoluminscence and Raman spectroscopy were used to analyse the structural, vibrational and emission characteristics of the pure and Nb/Nd co-doped TiO₂ samples. The sensitizer soaked Nb/Nd co-doped TiO₂ over FTO substrate was sandwiched with the graphite coated FTO incorporated with the redox couple of iodine/triiodide (I^–/I₃^–) occupying the layer between the photoanode and counter electrode to fabricate the solar cell architecture as FTO/Nb/Nd-TiO₂/dye/I^–/I₃^–/graphite-TiO₂/FTO. JV characteristic study was carried out for the solar cells with and without Nb/Nd co-doped TiO₂ with the sensitizer and it was found that, the solar cell with Nb/Nd co-doped TiO₂ produced an efficiency of 0.83% with open circuit voltage and short circuit current density of 0.67508 V and 2.3656 mA/cm².