Investigation of Mass Transport in Mesoporous Semiconducting Thin Film Electrodes

Development of novel thin film electrodes may enable new commercial products ranging from in vivo biosensors to solar cells.  A critical consideration that assists the engineering of working devices is mass transport of electro-active species and solvent/electrolytes within porous thin film electrodes.  Our presentation will focus on the fabrication and characterization of transport within thin film electrodes fabricated from titanium dioxide nanospheres, nanorods and nanotubes via sol-gel methods.  We will present initial characterization data for films deposited on indium tin oxide coated glass slides by doctor blade techniques.  Results include bright field and phase microscopy characterizations that probe the pore structure, surface morphology, and that yield physical dimensions of the films. Electron microscopy data will be presented that characterize particle dimensions and morphological differences resulting from multiple processing procedures.  Powder x-ray diffraction data will be presented that investigate the crystal structure of the semiconducting films.  Finally, mass transport properties as investigated by cyclic voltammetric techniques will be presented.  Results will be correlated with fabrication techniques and associated material types and morphologies.