Preparation of 1-methyl-3-propylimidazolium acetate and its application in dye sensitized solar cells

In this paper, we reported the preparation of 1-methyl-3-propylimidazolium acetate (MPIAc), which proceeded via the metathesis of 1-methyl-3-propylimidazolium iodide (MPII) and lead acetate or potassium acetate. The apparent diffusion coefficients of triiodide and iodide in binary ionic liquids, MPIAc and MPII with various weight ratios, were demonstrated by cyclic voltammetry using a Pt ultramicroelectrode. It was found that the apparent diffusion coefficients of triiodide increased and those of iodide slightly increased with the weight ratio increase of MPIAc and MPII. The dye sensitized solar cells with the electrolyte, which was composed of 0.13 M I2, 0.10 M LiI, 0.50 M 4-tert-butylpyrdine in the binary ionic liquid electrolyte of MPIAc (employing potassium acetate) and MPII (weight ratio 0.2), gave short circuit photocurrent density of 9.40 mA cm−2, open circuit voltage of 0.62 V, and fill factor of 0.57, corresponding to the photoelectric conversion efficiency of 3.34% at the illumination (air mass 1.5, 100 mW cm−2).