Investigation of an Electrochromic Device Based on Ammonium Metatungstate-Iron (II) Chloride Electrochromic Liquid.

Even though electrochromism has been around for more than 50 years, it still has several issues. Multi-layered films, high manufacturing costs, and a short lifetime are present in existing electrochromic devices. We demonstrate a unique high-performance device with a basic structure and no solid electrochromic sheets in this work. In this device, the electrolyte layer is also avoided. The device uses an electrochromic solution prepared from a mixture of ammonium metatungstate and iron (II) chloride solution as a functional layer with reversible redox properties. The tungstate ions on the electrode surface are reduced when the device is colored, and the Fe2+ on the electrode surface is oxidized on another electrode surface. The generated Fe3+ in the mixed functional layer oxidizes the previously reduced tungstate ions as the device fades. We determined the ΔT (transmittance modulation) and response time among ammonium metatungstate ratios, iron (II) chloride ratios, and driven current density using DOE (design of experiment) trials. Using 0.175 mol/L ammonium metatungstate and 0.30 mol/L iron (II) chloride, a device with outstanding ΔT (more than 57% at 700 nm), a short response time (less than 10 s), and high coloring efficiency (160.04 cm2/C at 700 nm) is demonstrated.

Temperature-Controlled Crystal Size of Wide Band Gap Nickel Oxide and Its Application in Electrochromism.

Nickel oxide (NiO) is a wide band gap semiconductor material that is used as an electrochromic layer or an ion storage layer in electrochromic devices. In this work, the effect of annealing temperature on sol-gel NiO films was investigated. Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) showed that the formation of NiO via decomposition of the precursor nickel acetate occurred at about 300 °C. Meanwhile, an increase in roughness was observed by Atomic force microscope (AFM), and precipitation of a large number of crystallites was observed at 500 °C. X-ray Diffraction (XRD) showed that the NiO film obtained at such a temperature showed a degree of crystallinity. The film crystallinity and crystallite size also increased with increasing annealing temperature. An ultraviolet spectrophotometer was used to investigate the optical band gap of the colored NiO films, and it was found that the band gap increased from 3.65 eV to 3.74 eV with the increase in annealing temperature. An electrochromic test further showed that optical modulation density and coloring efficiency decreased with the increase in crystallite size. The electrochromic reaction of the nickel oxide film is more likely to occur at the crystal interface and is closely related to the change of the optical band gap. An NiO film with smaller crystallite size is more conducive to ion implantation and the films treated at 300 °C exhibit optimum electrochromic behavior.