Hybrid solar cells have been fabricated using perylene monoimide-monoanhydride dyes with nanorod zinc oxide electrodes as electron transporting layers. We have investigated the influence of the spacer alkyl chain length of perylene monoimide-monoanhydride (PMIMA) dyes on the device performance in hybrid solar cells using nanorod zinc oxide electrodes. Nanorod zinc oxide electrodes with 50150 nm of diameter were synthesized in the presence of PEG400 by using microwave heating method. We observed that the dyes with longer and brunched alkyl chains exhibit higher efficiencies in hybrid solar cells. We report the highest efficiency obtained with zinc oxide nanorods under standard conditions for perylene monoimide-monoanhydride derivative with PMIMA_1 that performs 400 mV open circuit voltage, 2.81 mA/cm(2) short-circuit current and 0.59% overall conversion efficiency. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.