Structurally Simple and Easily Accessible Perylenes for Dye-Sensitized Solar Cells Applicable to Both 1 Sun and Dim-Light Environments

The need for low-cost and highly efficient dyes for dye-sensitized solar cells under both the sunlight and dim light environments is growing. We have devised <b>GJ</b>-series push–pull organic dyes which require only four synthesis steps. These dyes feature a linear molecular structure of donor–perylene–ethynylene–arylcarboxylic acid, where donor represents <i>N</i>,<i>N</i>-diarylamino group and arylcarboxylic groups represent benzoic, thienocarboxylic, 2-cyano-3-phenylacrylic, 2-cyano-3-thienoacrylic, and 4-benzo­[<i>c</i>]­[1,2,5]­thiadiazol-4-yl-benzoic groups. In this study, we demonstrated that a dye without tedious and time-consuming synthesis efforts can perform efficiently. Under the illumination of AM1.5G simulated sunlight, the benzothiadiazole-benzoic-containing <b>GJ-BP</b> dye shows the best power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 6.16% with <i>V</i>_OC of 0.70 V and <i>J</i>_SC of 11.88 mA cm^–2 using liquid iodide-based electrolyte. It also shows high performance in converting light of 6000 lx light intensity, that is, incident power of ca. 1.75 mW cm^–2, to power output of 0.28 mW cm^–2 which equals a PCE of 15.79%. Interestingly, the benzoic-containing dye <b>GJ-P</b> with a simple molecular structure has comparable performance in generating power output of 0.26 mW cm^–2 (PCE of 15.01%) under the same condition and is potentially viable toward future application