Standing wave enhancement of red absorbance and photocurrent in dye-sensitized titanium dioxide photoelectrodes coupled to photonic crystals.

The light harvesting efficiency of dye-sensitized photoelectrodes was enhanced by coupling a TiO(2) photonic crystal layer to a conventional film of TiO(2) nanoparticles. In addition to acting as a dielectric mirror, the inverse opal photonic crystal caused a significant change in dye absorbance which depended on the position of the stop band. Absorbance was suppressed at wavelengths shorter than the stop band maximum and was enhanced at longer wavelengths.