In this article, the preparation of a gel electrolyte that consists of a polysulfide electrolyte with xanthan gum (XG) thixotropic gel and TiO₂ nanoparticles (NPs) is reported for the development of improved performance of quantum-dot-sensitized solar cells (QDSSCs). Natural polysaccharide XG exhibited thixotropic sol−gel transitions, by which it can reversibly be converted from sols to high-viscosity gels under shear stress. XG is, for the first time, used to passivate the surface trap states or act as steric hindrance between TiO₂/QDs/electrolyte interfaces. The incorporation of TiO₂ NPs in the XG gel electrolyte improved the ionic conductivity of the gel electrolyte. For the Cu–In–Se QDSSC with gel electrolytes, the conversion efficiencies were 7.25% and 8.19% for XG and XG/NP gel electrolytes, respectively, whereas, the liquid electrolytes only delivered an efficiency of 6.86% under simulated sunlight (AM 1.5, 100 mW cm⁻²). Moreover, electrochemical analysis revealed that enhanced charge transfer and suppressed electron–hole recombination process occurred more frequently at the TiO₂/QDs/electrolyte in QDSSCs with the XG/NP gel electrolyte compared with those with the liquid and XG gel electrolyte. Most importantly, the XG/NP gel electrolyte is also effective in various I-III-VI-based QDSSCs, including Cu–In–S and Ag–In–Se QDSSCs, for improving the cell power conversion efficiencies and stability because of the synergistic effect of XG and TiO₂ NPs in polysulfide electrolytes. Notably, the best cell devices (Cu–In–S QDSSCs) constructed using XG/NP gel electrolytes have long-term stability under one-sun illumination, retaining 90% of the initial device's efficiency after 150 h.

在本文中，报道了一种由多硫化物电解质与黄原胶（XG）触变凝胶和TiO ₂纳米颗粒（NPs）组成的凝胶电解质的制备，用于开发量子点敏化太阳能电池（QDSSC）的改进性能。 。天然多糖XG表现出触变溶胶-凝胶转变，在剪切应力作用下，它可以可逆地从溶胶转变为高粘度凝胶。XG首次用于钝化表面陷阱态或充当TiO ₂ / QDs /电解质界面之间的空间位阻。TiO ₂的掺入XG凝胶电解质中的NP改善了凝胶电解质的离子电导率。对于使用凝胶电解质的Cu-In-Se QDSSC，XG和XG / NP凝胶电解质的转换效率分别为7.25％和8.19％，而在模拟阳光下，液体电解质的转换效率仅为6.86％（AM 1.5 ，100 mW cm ^-2）。此外，电化学分析表明，在TiO _2上，电荷转移增强和电子-空穴复合过程抑制更为频繁。带有XG / NP凝胶电解质的QDSSC中的/ QDs /电解质与带有液态和XG凝胶电解质的QDSSC中的/ QDs /电解质。最重要的是，XG / NP凝胶电解质在各种基于I-III-VI的QDSSC中也有效，包括Cu-In-S和Ag-In-Se QDSSC，由于具有协同作用，因此可以提高电池功率转换效率和稳定性。 XG和TiO ₂ NPs在多硫化物电解质中的作用 值得注意的是，使用XG / NP凝胶电解质构造的最佳电池器件（Cu-In-S QDSSC）在单光照射下具有长期稳定性，在150小时后仍能保持初始器件效率的90％。