April 22 - 26, 2024
Seattle, Washington
May 7 - 9, 2024 (Virtual)

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2024 MRS Spring Meeting

Symposium EN01-Application Targets for Next-Generation Photovoltaics

The emergence of photovoltaic (PV) technologies based on thin-film semiconductor materials has been one of the most disruptive events in the field of solar energy for many years. While silicon dominates the solar market today, emerging semiconductors such as perovskites, organics and new compounds are seen as promising candidates for new applications in low cost and low embodied energy, spectrally tuned light harvesting. This potential is now underpinned by impressive laboratory-scale efficiencies (for example 19% for organic solar cells and > 25% for organohalide perovskites) achieved by sophisticated molecular engineering and a deep understanding of loss mechanisms.

The time has now come to drive these technologies into market adoption and certain ‘application targets’ such as agrivoltaics, space application, non-conventional and extreme environments and indoor light-harvesting for IoT seem ideal platforms to enable this adoption. This symposium endeavours to gather leading experts from around the world aiming to identify and describe application targets for next-generation photovoltaic devices. In this regard, the symposium will particularly focus on areas such as upscaling, stability/lifetime, state-of-the-art materials for photoactive layers and ancillary components, green solvent processing, new material processing and device fabrication techniques, upscaled device characterization and simulation, differences in device physics between standard solar illumination, and more bespoke conditions such as indoor lighting, and cost evaluation of technologically relevant ‘whole systems’.

Topics will include:

  • Ultra-light-weight, high power density PV for communications/aerospace-related technologies
  • Scaling of organic and perovskite solar cells for large-area devices
  • Semi-transparent solar cells and building integration of PV technologies
  • Indoor PV for Internet of Things (IoT)
  • PV-battery integration and system architectures
  • Printable solar cells and environmentally friendly manufacturing
  • PV cost and life cycle analysis
  • Agrivoltaic
  • Integration of PV in non-conventional and extreme environments
  • Stability/lifetime analysis
  • Organic, perovskite and quantum dot solar cell fabrication using green solvents
  • Emerging inorganic semiconductors for photovoltaic

Invited Speakers:

  • Harald Ade (North Carolina State University, USA)
  • Derya Baran (King Abdullah University of Science and Technology, Saudi Arabia)
  • Kethinni Chittibabu (Ambient Photonics, USA)
  • Paul Dastoor (The University of Newcastle, Australia)
  • Aldo di Carlo (Università degli Studi di Roma Tor Vergata, Italy)
  • Martin Green (University of New South Wales, Australia)
  • Rene Janssen (Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, Netherlands)
  • Paul Meredith (Swansea University, United Kingdom)
  • Laura Miranda-Perez (Oxford PV, United Kingdom)
  • Dieter Neher (University of Potsdam, Germany)
  • Jenny Nelson (Imperial College London, United Kingdom)
  • Thuc-Quyen Nguyen (University of California, Santa Barbara, USA)
  • Ian Marius Peters (Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH, Germany)
  • Safa Shoaee (University of Potsdam, Germany)
  • Marko Topič (University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)
  • Iris Visoly-Fisher (Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel)
  • Guillaume Wantz (Laboratoire de l’Intégration du Matériau au Système, France)

Symposium Organizers

Ardalan Armin
Swansea University
United Kingdom

Christoph Brabec
University of Erlangen–Nuremberg
Department of Materials Science and Engineering
Germany

Nicola Gasparini
Imperial College London
Department of Chemistry
United Kingdom

Ellen Moons
Karlstad University
Physics
Sweden

Topics

organic perovskites polymer quantum materials solvent casting