CHARACTERIZATION OF CHLOROFORM EXTRACT OF CORDIA MACLEODII LEAF FOR POSSIBLE APPLICATION IN DYE SENSITIZED SOLAR CELL

Dye synthesized solar cells have received intensified research efforts in the past decades in both academia and industry, due to the increasing demand for sustainable clean energy. Dyes play an important role in the high performance of solar cell. Dye sensitized solar cells are a viable alternative to the conventional silicon based photovoltaic devices due to their remarkable conversion efficiencies. As a relatively new class of photovoltaic devices with a photoelectrochemical system consisting of a dye-sensitized semiconductor film and an electrolyte, dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) have been regarded as a promising alternative to conventional solid-state semiconductor solar cells. In this work, we have extracted the natural dye from Cordia Macleodii leaf and the chloroformic extract was further subjected to characterization studies using FTIR spectroscopy to understand the nature of the dye and to find its suitability for dye sensitized solar cell application.