Extraction of nano-silicon with activated carbons simultaneously from rice husk and their synergistic catalytic effect in counter electrodes of dye-sensitized solar cells

There is no author summary for this article yet. Authors can add summaries to their articles on ScienceOpen to make them more accessible to a non-specialist audience.

Abstract

The extraction of renewable energy resources particularly from earth abundant materials has always been a matter of significance in industrial products. Herein, we report a novel simultaneous extraction of nano-silicon with activated carbons (nano-Si@ACs) from rice husk (RH) by chemical activation method. As-extracted nano-Si@ACs is then used as an energy harvesting materials in counter electrodes (CEs) of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs). The morphology, structure and texture studies confirm the high surface area, abundant active sites and porous structure of nano-Si@ACs. Electrochemical impedance spectroscopy and cyclic voltammetry analyses reveal that the nano-Si@ACs is highly beneficial for fast I ₃ ⁻ reduction and superior electrolyte diffusion capability. The nano-Si@ACs CE based DSSC exhibits enhanced power conversion efficiency of (8.01%) in contrast to pristine Pt CE (7.20%). These favorable results highlight the potential application of RH in low-cost, high-efficiency and Pt-free DSSCs.

Related collections

Most cited references 24

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Highly graphitized nitrogen-doped porous carbon nanopolyhedra derived from ZIF-8 nanocrystals as efficient electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reactions.

Linjie Zhang, Zixue Su, Feilong Jiang … (2014)

Nitrogen-doped graphitic porous carbons (NGPCs) have been synthesized by using a zeolite-type nanoscale metal-organic framework (NMOF) as a self-sacrificing template, which simultaneously acts as both the carbon and nitrogen sources in a facile carbonization process. The NGPCs not only retain the nanopolyhedral morphology of the parent NMOF, but also possess rich nitrogen, high surface area and hierarchical porosity with well-conducting networks. The promising potential of NGPCs as metal-free electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reactions (ORR) in fuel cells is demonstrated. Compared with commercial Pt/C, the optimized NGPC-1000-10 (carbonized at 1000 °C for 10 h) catalyst exhibits comparable electrocatalytic activity via an efficient four-electron-dominant ORR process coupled with superior methanol tolerance as well as cycling stability in alkaline media. Furthermore, the controlled experiments reveal that the optimum activity of NGPC-1000-10 can be attributed to the synergetic contributions of the abundant active sites with high graphitic-N portion, high surface area and porosity, and the high degree of graphitization. Our findings suggest that solely MOF-derived heteroatom-doped carbon materials can be a promising alternative for Pt-based catalysts in fuel cells.

0 comments Cited 187 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Chemical reduction of three-dimensional silica micro-assemblies into microporous silicon replicas.

Charlotte S M Allan, Thomas Summers, Z Kang … (2007)

The carbothermal reduction of silica into silicon requires the use of temperatures well above the silicon melting point (> or =2,000 degrees C). Solid silicon has recently been generated directly from silica at much lower temperatures ( 500 m(2) g(-1)), and contained a significant population of micropores (< or =20 A). The silicon replicas were photoluminescent, and exhibited rapid changes in impedance upon exposure to gaseous nitric oxide (suggesting a possible application in microscale gas sensing). This process enables the syntheses of microporous nanocrystalline silicon micro-assemblies with multifarious three-dimensional shapes inherited from biological or synthetic silica templates for sensor, electronic, optical or biomedical applications.

0 comments Cited 156 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

Record: found
Abstract: found
Article: not found

Optically transparent cathode for dye-sensitized solar cells based on graphene nanoplatelets.

J K Yum, Michael Grätzel, Ladislav Kavan (2011)

Commercial graphene nanoplatelets in the form of optically transparent thin films on F-doped SnO(2) (FTO) exhibited high electrocatalytic activity toward I(3)(-)/I(-) redox couple, particularly in electrolyte based on ionic liquid (Z952). The charge-transfer resistance, R(CT), was smaller by a factor of 5-6 in ionic liquid, compared to values in traditional electrolyte based on methoxypropionitrile solution (Z946). Optical spectra and electrochemical impedance confirm that the film's absorbance scales linearly with R(CT)(-1). Electrocatalytic properties of graphene nanoplatelets for the I(3)(-)/I(-) redox reaction are proportional to the concentration of active sites (edge defects and oxidic groups), independent of the electrolyte medium. Dye-sensitized solar cell (DSC) was assembled with this material as a cathode. Semitransparent (>85%) film of graphene nanoplatelets presented no barrier to drain photocurrents at 1 Sun illumination and potentials between 0 and ca. 0.3 V, but an order of magnitude decrease of R(CT) is still needed to improve the behavior of DSC near the open circuit potential and, consequently, the fill factor. We predict that the graphene composite is a strong candidate for replacing both Pt and FTO in cathodes for DSC.

0 comments Cited 103 times – based on 0 reviews      Review now

Bookmark

All references

Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (nlm-ta): Sci Rep

Journal ID (iso-abbrev): Sci Rep

Title: Scientific Reports

Publisher: Nature Publishing Group

ISSN (Electronic): 2045-2322

Publication date (Electronic): 21 December 2016

Publication date Collection: 2016

Volume: 6

Electronic Location Identifier: 39314

Affiliations

[1 ]Center for Nanoscale Characterization & Devices (CNCD), Wuhan National Laboratory for Optoelectronics (WNLO) & School of Physics, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST) , Luoyu Road 1037, Wuhan 430074, P. R. China

[2 ]Center of Advanced Functional Ceramics (CAFC), Nanjing University of Posts and Telecommunications (NUPT) , Nanjing 210046, P. R. China

[3 ]Hubei Collaborative Innovation Center for Advanced Organic Chemical Materials , 368 Youyi Avenue, Wuhan 430062, P. R. China

Author notes

[a ] gaoyihua@ 123456hust.edu.cn

Article

Publisher Item ID: srep39314

DOI: 10.1038/srep39314

PMC ID: 5175195

PubMed ID: 28000720

SO-VID: b0f0a3ca-fe00-4875-b59e-55d66826f9b7

License:

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons license, unless indicated otherwise in the credit line; if the material is not included under the Creative Commons license, users will need to obtain permission from the license holder to reproduce the material. To view a copy of this license, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Extraction of nano-silicon with activated carbons simultaneously from rice husk and their synergistic catalytic effect in counter electrodes of dye-sensitized solar cells

Read this article at

Abstract

Related collections

Renewable Energy - Solar

Most cited references 24

Highly graphitized nitrogen-doped porous carbon nanopolyhedra derived from ZIF-8 nanocrystals as efficient electrocatalysts for oxygen reduction reactions.

Chemical reduction of three-dimensional silica micro-assemblies into microporous silicon replicas.

Optically transparent cathode for dye-sensitized solar cells based on graphene nanoplatelets.

Author and article information

Journal

Affiliations

Author notes

Article

History

Categories

Comments

Comment on this article

Similar content 120

Cited by 9

Most referenced authors 217