| Summary: | In this study, P25-titanium dioxide (TiO<sub>2</sub>) was doped with ruthenium (Ru) by systematically varying the Ru content at 0.15, 0.30, 0.45 and 0.6 mol%. The synthesized Ru-doped TiO<sub>2</sub> nanomaterials have been characterized by X-ray diffraction (XRD), Raman spectroscopy, energy-dispersive X-ray (EDX) analysis, UV-visible (UV−Vis) spectroscopy, and electrochemical impedance (EIS) spectroscopy. The XRD patterns of undoped and Ru-doped TiO<sub>2</sub> nanomaterials confirm the presence of mixed anatase and rutile phases of TiO<sub>2</sub> while EDX spectrum confirms the presence of Ti, O and Ru. Further, UV-visible absorption spectra of doped TiO<sub>2</sub> nanomaterial reveal a slight red shift on Ru-doping. The short circuit current density (J<sub>SC</sub>) of the cells fabricated using the Ru-doped TiO<sub>2</sub> photoanode was found to be dependent on the amount of Ru present in TiO<sub>2</sub>. Optimized cells with 0.3 mol% Ru-doped TiO<sub>2</sub> electrodes showed efficiency which is 20% more than the efficiency of the control cell (η = 5.8%) under stimulated illumination (100 mWcm<sup>−2</sup>, 1 sun) with AM 1.5 filter. The increase in J<sub>SC</sub> resulted from the reduced rate of recombination upon doping of Ru and this was confirmed by EIS analysis.
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