Abstract

Natural dyes extracted from the leaves and flowers of Commelino nudiflora was utilized as sensitizer in dye sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) by using a solvent system of distilled water, methanol and M HNO3 in the ratio 10: 9: 1. Also, the crude extract was purified to obtain anthocyanins from the leaves and flowers. Optical characterizations of the dyes were conducted by using UV-vis absorption and electrical characterization was determined using a solar simulator. Optical absorption for the crude extracts indicates an absorption in the visible range (400 nm) with the leaves extract showing better absorbance. Optical absorption for the purified extracts indicates the leaves extract has better absorbance though they show similar pattern. The crude flower extract has the highest efficiency of 0.00389 %. The characteristics of the dye-sensitized solar cell (DSSC) has been simulated using MATLAB based on TiO2 by modifying the internal parameters. The simulated results show that the crude and purified extracts for the leaves showed a better power conversion efficiency in comparison to the flower extracts.

Keywords: Anthocyanins, Electrical properties Op, and Optical properties