Weekly Progress

Week 1: Project team came up with goals wanted to accomplish with improving cell and wrote a draft of a project proposal to receive feedback from.

Week 2: Edited and finalized project proposal, which includes all activities we will be doing over the course of the term.

Week 3: We obtained a solar cell kit, researched dyes, and began familiarizing ourselves with materials.

Week 4: The titanium dioxide paste was made in the lab.  We continued to research dye to possibly get for the experiment. We obtained blueberries and raspberries for the use of dyes in cells.

Week 5: We finalized and a ordered dye, Coumarin 6, for the experiment from a chemical company online.

Week 6: We received the coumarin dye and started making the solar cell. We had various trials and errors with making various TiO2 pastes. One version of paste cracked and another version of a paste stayed smooth.

Week 7: We made a TiO2 paste with a thick consistency and a paste with a thinner consistency.  With each type of paste, we made cells using blueberry dye and blackberry dye.  We then recorded our observations and collected various types of data to make conclusions from.

Week 8: We made cells using coumarin 6 dye and collected the same data as we did when making the cells with berry dye.  We then compared the results amongst the different cells.

Week 9: We made our final conclusions from our results.  We wrote the final report and created a presentation to present in week 10.  We rehearsed the presentation.

Week 10: Submitted the final report, and presented our complete led researched project.