Projects


Improved efficiency of thin film Photovoltaic devices

Rachael Greenhalgh, University of Loughborough

Collaboration with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and Colorado School of Mines (CSM) in the United States has shown ...... (read more)

Understanding degradation mechanisms in perovskite based PV devices

Claire Greenland, University of Sheffield

Stability of performance is probably the most critical factor in determining the potential for commercialisation of a new PV technology. ...... (read more)

Perovskite heterojunctions by vapour deposition

Kilian Lohmann, University of Oxford

Metal halide perovskite materials have emerged over the past few years as a particularly promising PV technology, with power conversation ...... (read more)

Hot-carrier harvesting in hybrid metal halide perovskites for solar cells

Alexander Knight, University of Oxford

Photovoltaic cells incorporating hybrid organic inorganic metal halide perovskites have seen a phenomenally rapid improvement over the past 5 years, ...... (read more)

Transparent conducting oxide glass coatings for photovoltaics

Jack Swallow, University of Liverpool

Transparent conducting oxides (TCOs) are remarkable semiconductor materials that, as their name suggests, combine transparency with electrical conductivity, two normally ...... (read more)

Fullerene-free photovoltaic devices

Emma Spooner, University of Sheffield

Non-fullerene acceptors have recently been used in polymer-blend photovoltaic devices to achieve power conversion efficiencies that now exceed 12%. In ...... (read more)

Understanding the role of dielectric permittivity in charge transfer in organic materials

Josh Macdonald, University of Bath

Poor performance in organic photovoltaics has often been accredited to the low dielectric function (< 5) of organic materials impacting ...... (read more)

Perovskite Solar Cells

Olivia Ashton, University of Oxford

This project will focus on research associated with perovskite solar cells. The main aim will be to create a perovskite ...... (read more)

Band gap tuning of metal halide perovskites for multi-junction all perovskite solar cells

Jonathan Warby, University of Oxford

ABX3 perovskite solar cells, where A is methyl ammonium, formamidinium or Cs, B is Pb or Sn and X is ...... (read more)

An in-situ SEM study of hybrid perovskite materials during annealing and under applied bias

Adam Urwick, University of Sheffield

The next generation of thin film solution processed perovskite photovoltaic devices could potentially reduce the financial and energy cost associated ...... (read more)

Breaking the Voltage Barrier for CdTe Solar Cells

Thomas Shalvey, University of Liverpool

Polycrystalline CdTe solar cells are a mass market product and have now achieved >21% efficiency, having being limited to <16.7% ...... (read more)

Novel low-cost and abundant absorber layers for thin film solar cells

Samuel Beddoe, University of Southampton

There is overwhelming evidence that our increasing consumption of fossil fuels and the associated emission of carbon dioxide is leading ...... (read more)

Spin-blocked Recombination in Organic Photovoltaics

Daniel Sowood, University of Cambridge

The technology of plastic electronics unlocks new ways to use solar energy, not only by supplementing and replacing conventional silicon ...... (read more)

Band alignment optimisation for enhanced inorganic thin film photovoltaics

Matthew Smiles, University of Liverpool

Semiconductor thin films are the basis of the lowest cost per Watt solar cells. While these technologies are well established, ...... (read more)

Mesoscale simulations of polymer based organic photovoltaics, OPV

Alexander Smith, University of Bath

While the focus on energy level tuning in OPV materials has afforded large gains in device performance, strategies based on ...... (read more)

Hotwire Chemical Vapour Deposition of Boron Doped Epitaxial Silicon for Interdigitated Back Contact Solar Cells

Edris Khorani, University of Southampton

Silicon solar cells remain the dominant technology in the photovoltaic market. The interdigitated back contact (IBC) design is a well-established ...... (read more)

New design features in lightweight and low-cost inverted CdTe solar cells

Tom Baines, University of Liverpool

Thin film cadmium telluride (CdTe) solar cells have now achieved >20% efficiency and are the market leading thin film PV ...... (read more)

Photophysics of organometal halide perovskite materials for next-generation solar cells

Elizabeth Parrott, University of Oxford

Increasing world needs for electrical power have intensified research into materials suitable for cheap and efficient solar cells. Solution-processed semiconductors ...... (read more)

Modelling Ion Motion and Hysteresis in Perovskites

Laurence Bennett, University of Southampton

Organolead halide perovskite solar cells have shown dramatic increases in efficiency to around 20% since their inception in 2012. Nevertheless ...... (read more)

Pyrolysis of solution-processed CZTS for upscale

Lewis Wright, University of Loughborough

Current methods for making solar panels are either expensive, slow, energy intensive, toxic, or every combination of all four. Lewis' ...... (read more)

Stability of Hybrid Perovskites for Tandem Solar Cells

Leonardo Buizza, University of Oxford

Hybrid metal halide perovskites have emerged as an important new class of materials for photovoltaics. Their integration in tandem with ...... (read more)

Identifying key deep level defects in thin film solar cells

Jacob Leaver, University of Liverpool

Thin film solar cells are a 2nd generation photovoltaic technology capable of producing equivalent performance to standard silicon based solar ...... (read more)

Pushing to 20% efficient solution grown CIGS thin film solar cells

Liam Welch, University of Loughborough

Successful deposition of thin film solar cells, such as CdTe and CIGS, have historically been limited to devices grown using ...... (read more)

Inverted designs for CdTe solar cells

Luke Thomas, University of Liverpool

Polycrystalline thin-film CdTe solar cells are a mass-market product, have now achieved >22% solar conversion efficiency and are the lowest ...... (read more)

Photovoltaics to Power the Internet of Things

Darcy Unson, University of Cambridge

It is hard for any new photovoltaic (PV) technology to beat silicon in bulk power generation, but there are many ...... (read more)

Nano-texturing of multicrystalline silicon

Jack James Tyson, University of Southampton

Crystalline silicon is currently the dominant photovoltaics technology, accounting for over 90% of the global PV market. Of this, multicrystalline ...... (read more)

Hybrid semiconductor nanocrystals/perovskite solar cells

Christopher Bailey, University of Southampton

The rapid rise in efficiency of thin-film solar cells using organometal halide perovskite semiconductors has made this class of photovoltaic ...... (read more)

Mesoscale model of charge transport in 2D Ruddlesden-Popper perovskite solar cells

Lewis Irvine, University of Bath

3D organic-inorganic perovskites are promising since the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of solar cells made from these materials have gone ...... (read more)

Encapsulation technologies for thin-film photovoltaic devices

Joel Smith, University of Sheffield

This project will develop a range of encapsulation materials and techniques for both polymer:fullerene and perovskite PV devices. A range ...... (read more)

Graphene and carbon nanotube based PV electrodes

Bernd Sturdza, University of Oxford

Both graphene and carbon nanotubes have very high electrical conductivities and mechanical strength, which makes them ideally suited for use ...... (read more)

New heterostructures for perovskite solar cells and investigation of the stability of methylammonium lead iodide layers

Silvia Mariotti, University of Liverpool

The project is to establish the band line ups for perovskite materials in combination with II-VI semiconductors and transparent conducting ...... (read more)

Investigating Alternative Transparent Electrodes for Photovoltaic Devices

Francesco Bastianini, University of Sheffield

In this project, the student will investigate the use of various composites of conducting polymer materials and metallic nanoparticles to ...... (read more)

Understanding the Role of the Electron Selective Contact in Perovskite Solar Cells

Matthew Pilot, University of Bath

Perovskite solar cells (PSC) have generated excitement in the field of emerging photovoltaics due to their high efficiencies, easy manufacturability ...... (read more)

Simple Scalable Superstrate Cells wtih Good Thermal Stability and High Voc.

Kaya Davies Brechley, University of Bath

The project will focus on the development, optimisation and characterisation of printed/solution processed solar cells with carbon contacts. We will ...... (read more)

The microstructure and electrical properties of grain boundaries in polycrystalline thin film photovoltaic devices

Vladislav Kornienko, University of Loughborough

Recombination of charge carriers occurring at defects and grain boundaries (GBs) are detrimental to the electrical performance of thin film ...... (read more)

Singlet Exciton Fission based Luminescent Solar Concentrators

Tomi Baikie, University of Cambridge

Luminescent solar concentrators (LSCs) comprise a transparent plastic film doped with luminophores that absorb and remit light. The light is ...... (read more)

Ultrathin hybrid photovoltaics

Giacomo Piana, University of Southampton

Multiple Exciton Generation in Nanoparticle Solar Cells

Heather Goodwin, University of Cambridge

Solar cells based on single semiconductors as the active layer are typically restricted in efficiency by the Shockley-Queisser limit, since ...... (read more)

Spray-coating perovskite PV devices over curved substrates

Elena Cassella, University of Sheffield

Conventional PV cells based on the ubiquitous semiconductor crystalline-silicon most often come in the form of flat, rigid and relatively ...... (read more)

Multi-Scale Simulations of Point and Extended Defects in Thin-Film Solar Cells

Lucy Whalley, University of Bath

A general problem with developing new materials for photovoltaics is that while a bulk material may appear to fulfil the ...... (read more)

Long-range energy transfer in singlet fission materials

David Bossanyi, University of Sheffield

Despite their early promise and intrinsic sustainability (low embodied energy, efficient use of abundant and non-toxic materials), organic photovoltaics still ...... (read more)

1) Perovskite photovoltaic devices 2) Back Contact PSCs

Mike Stringer, University of Sheffield

1) A focus on new perovskite precursors, charge transport layers and encapsulations methods to simultaneously improve efficiency and stability of ...... (read more)

Characterizing the nanoscale morphology of Organic Metal Halide photovoltaic materials

Konstantinos Tsevas, University of Sheffield

In this project, the student will investigate the influence of processing conditions on the micro- and nano-structure of the perovskite ...... (read more)

Vapour Deposition of Perovskite Solar Cells

Juliane Borchert, University of Oxford

Increasing world needs for electrical power have intensified research into materials suitable for cheap and efficient solar cells. To the ...... (read more)

Upscaling Vapour Deposited Perovskite Solar Cells

Elisabeth Duijnstee, University of Oxford

Metal halide Perovskite solar cells have emerged as promising semiconductor devices for next generation photovoltaics. Remarkably, the power conversion efficiency ...... (read more)

Combinatorial TCO physics and optimization for photovoltaics

Thomas Featherstone, University of Liverpool

Transparent Conducting Oxides (TCOs) are common to almost all current and emerging solar cell technologies and there is still a ...... (read more)

Microstructure and functionality in thin film solar cells from sustainable materials

Peter Yates, University of Liverpool

The project is to use state of the art electron microscopy alongside the synthesis effort in order to accelerate the ...... (read more)

Micro-structural defects in thin film photovoltaic devices

Thomas Fiducia, University of Loughborough

The efficiency of thin-film PV is limited by atomic-scale defects in the material (grain boundaries, planar defects, point defects etc). ...... (read more)

Anti-soiling coatings for Solar modules

Adam Law, University of Loughborough

Soiling of the cover glass on solar modules is a serious problem. Global reports show that soiling can reduce power ...... (read more)

Charge separation at perovskite/singlet fission material interfaces

Alan Bowman, University of Cambridge

As solar cells continue to improve, their efficiencies will approach the Shockley-Queisser limit of 33%. To overcome this limit, multiple ...... (read more)

Carbon based electrode technologies for novel solar cells

Giulio Mazzotta, University of Oxford

Over recent years several innovations have been introduced in order to move from a conventional silicon based photovoltaics to new ...... (read more)

Doping strategies for next generation CdTe solar cells

Kerrie Morris, University of Loughborough

Over the last 6 years, CdTe photovoltaics (PV) have enjoyed a steady performance improvement after remaining relatively stagnant for the ...... (read more)