Crosslinkable ruthenium complex dye, Ru(2,2'-bipyridine-4,4'-bicarboxylic acid)(4,4'-bis((4-vinyl benzyloxy)methyl)-2,2'-bipyridine)(NCS)(2) (denoted as Ru-S dye), was synthesized and characterized using (1)H-NMR, (13)C-NMR, Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) and UV/vis spectroscopies. The power conversion efficiency of dye-sentitized solar cell (DSSC) using Ru-S and liquid electrolyte containing lithium iodide (LiI) reached 7.53% under standard global AM 1.5 full sunlight, which is partly attributed to Li(+) being coordinated by Ru-S as verified by ATR-FTIR spectroscopy. As Ru-S was further crosslinked with glycerol propoxylate triacrylate (GPTA), not only 89% of dye retained on TiO(2) mesoporous surface after rinsed by 0.1 N NaOH aqueous solution, the power efficiency was also increased to 7.88%. As poly(methyl acrylate) was used to gel the electrolyte system, the power efficiency of DSSC with Ru-S dye was 6.96% but increased to 7.57% after crosslinking with GPTA. Notably, both DSSCs showed a good long-term stability after one month storage. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.