Tunable synthesis of mesoporous titania with different morphologies for dye-sensitized solar cells

Different TiO 2 mesoporous structures, including core-shell spheres (CCSs) and micro-tubes (MTs), are synthesized through adjusting the pH of the solution using TiOSO 4 as titanium source in a hydrothermal route. TiO 2 CSSs with an average diameter of 1.3–3.5 μm exhibit excellent light scattering property and high specific surface area (177.63 m 2 g −1 ). TiO 2 MTs show ultrahigh specific surface area of 276.03 m 2 g −1 . Dye-sensitized solar cell is fabricated using TiO 2 CSSs as the light scattering layer and TiO 2 nanoparticles (NPs) layer as the bottom layer. The efficiency of Cell-NPs + CSSs is up to 9.24% due to the good light scattering effect and excellent dye loading capacity. Furthermore, TiO 2 MTs are introduced to form the NPs/MTs bottom layer. The Cell-NPs/MTs + CSSs achieves an outstanding efficiency of 9.60% due to the further optimized electron transport path.