Printed Photovoltaics
Research Team
Organic Photovoltaics and Perovskites Research Team
Hind Alsayyed is a BEng Chemical Engineering graduate from Swansea University. Hind is currently a PhD student sponsored by NSG Pilkington.
Hind's academic supervisor is Dr Wing Chung Tsoi and her work is focussed on fabrication and characterisation of semi-transparent organic solar cells. Hind's focus is on the development of semi-transparent top electrodes and active layers using organic materials through solution-processable techniques.
Scale Up and Processing Research Team
Becky is a research assistant in Professor Watson’s sheet-to-sheet printed solar cells group. Her key area of research is the upscaling and optimisation of large area, screen printed, perovskite solar modules.
Becky has a doctorate and bachelors degree in Materials Science and Engineering, both completed at Swansea University. Her area of expertise was originally in electrochemistry and the inhibition of corrosion on strip steel. Her EngD, sponsored by Tata Steel, investigated the delamination resistance of organic films from novel physical vapour deposited Zn-Mg coatings.
Awards: Sidney Gilchrist Thomas Prize in Metallurgy (for best Materials Engineering student in Level 3) and the Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining Prize (for best overall performance in Materials Engineering).
Organic Photovoltaics and Perovskites Research Team
With concerns surrounding fossil fuels, solar technologies are likely to play a key role in future energy generation. Silicon photovoltaics are currently the most abundant technology.
However, organic solar cells (OSCs) may offer several benefits over silicon technologies. These include reduced weight, increased flexibility, reduced costs and compatibility with less energy intensive, low-temperature, high-throughput solution processing. Whilst OSC efficiencies are now approaching the levels of silicon, two key challenges remain: stability and scalability. Andrew's research aims to tackle these issues by elucidating the causes behind poor device stability and investigating the factors limiting the performance of slot-die coated OSCs.
Organic Photovoltaics and Perovskites Research Team
Ram’s research interests are mainly focused on the development of solution-processable organic solar cells for transparent windows, indoor as well as space applications.
His expertise is on developing organic solar cells based on polymers, and small molecules donors as well as fullerene and non-fullerene acceptors, by using solution-processable methods. Ram has a particular interest in investigating down conversion material (DCMS) to improve the power conversion efficiency, including the stability of solar cells devices.
Dr Datt obtained his PhD in Engineering Science (Thesis Title: “Development of Organic Photovoltaic Devices based on Novel Organic Molecules”) from CSIR- National Physical Laboratory, New Delhi, India under the supervision of Dr Vinay Gupta (SSB Awardee in Physics, 2017). He obtained his Master of Technology (M. Tech, 2013) (nanotechnology) and Bachelor of Engineering (BE, 2011) (Electronics and communication) degrees from School of Nanotechnology, RGPV Bhopal and RJIT Tekanpur, Gwalior, India, respectively.
Applied Photochemistry and Circular Economy Research Team
Alexander Doolin is currently a PhD student within Professor Matthew Davies' research group with a research focus on improving the stability and sustainability of perovskite photovoltaics.
To date, Alexander's research has revolved around the sustainable substitution of hazardous solvents used in the manufacture of perovskite solar cells (PSCs) through the application of green chemistry principles. Alexander's main aim is to elucidate the role of processing solvents as applied to a variety of perovskite compositions using photochemical characterisation techniques (primarily fluorescence spectroscopy).
Prior to undertaking a PhD, Alexander graduated with an MEng in Chemical Engineering from Swansea University.
Applied Photochemistry and Circular Economy Research Team
Rodrigo has worked in research projects strongly related with renewable energies, including dye-sensitized solar cells, perovskite solar cells and characterization of semiconductor materials for water splitting.
This includes the development of hybrid and organic photovoltaics at CINVESTAV-IPN (Mexico) and a two-year postdoctoral project on ion migration in perovskite solar cells at the University of Bath. Rodrigo’s current research is focused on the study of printable PV materials (perovskite, organic and dye-sensitized solar cells) via steady state and time resolved photochemical techniques (ns-transient absorption spectroscopy, Time-Correlated Single-Photon Counting) to develop an understanding of the device photophysics and photochemistry in order to correlate material properties to stability and device performance.
Rodrigo is also a member of the National System of Researchers in Mexico, Level 1 (SNI 1) in the area of Technology and Engineering.
Organic Photovoltaics and Perovskites Research Team
Declan is a research assistant in Dr Wing Chung Tsoi's group looking at the stability and performance of perovskite solar cells under mimic aerospace applications. The two main areas of interest are stratospheric conditions, which is related to HAPS applications e.g. Airbus Zephyr, and Low Earth Orbit (LEO) conditions. The performance of perovskite solar cells under space conditions is also relevant for my PhD.
Declan's main focus within these two fields is the thermal stability of perovskite devices under cold and hot temperatures (-100 to +85 °C)and the proton radiation hardness of perovskite devices, with the current 150 keV proton stability record being the carbon stack made here at SPECIFIC. Additionally, Declan is also looking at new encapsulation techniques to reduce device weight and maximise the specific power (power-to-weight ratio).
Before starting his PhD, Declan completed his masters in physics (MPhys) in which he looked at the use of ADS/CFT to couple gravity with QED and link the hawking temperature of a black hole to the superconducting phase transition temperature.
Nanomaterials Research Team
Rafael Martí Valls is from Spain. His expertise resides in the fields of Materials Science and Inorganic Chemistry, specializing in metal-oxides and metal-chalcogenides.
Rafael obtained his PhD in Materials Chemistry and Solar Cells at the Universitat Jaume I (Spain). During this period of time he worked on the synthesis and deposition of photoabsorbent materials for CIGS and CZTS solar devices.
After that Rafael moved to the Netherlands. There he began to work in the industry for a company devoted to the development of nanotechnology-based optical coatings, with a wide range of applications such as heat shielding, antistatic, antifouling or antiglare.
In November 2019, Rafael started working as a Technology Transfer Fellow at Swansea University. His work is focused on the synthesis, manufacturing films and characterisation of metal oxides for Perovskites Solar Cells or photoactive coatings among others. Rafael is also in charge of the ALD equipment.
Scale Up and Processing Research Team
Ershad joined Swansea University in the Autumn of 2020 as a postdoctoral research assistant. Currently, he is working in R2R team at SPECIFIC centre.
Ershad’s main activity here is developing printable perovskite devices with increased stability. He also works on translate any developments at slot-die coating level to roll to roll level. Ershad started experimental research on third generation of solar cells when he was a MSc student, by making DSSCs. After two years of study on dye sensitized solar cells, Ershad changed his field to printed perovskite devices and then focused on that for four years during his PhD period.
Applied Photochemistry and Circular Economy Research Team
Emmanuel obtained his PhD on the photochemistry of perovskite solar cells at Swansea University in 2020. He recently obtained an IMPACT fellowship to build a time-resolved microwave photoconductivity setup, which will allow to probe the complex physics and chemistry of perovskite materials.
Emmanuel’s expertise is in probing the intrinsic properties of perovskite materials such as charge carrier recombination rate constants. In particular, he specialises on superoxide yield measurements, and steady-state and time-resolved photoluminescence measurements. He also works on theoretical simulations of charge carrier recombinations in perovskite materials.
Device Physics and Applications Research Team
Michael started as an ICASE PhD student at SPECIFIC in 2018 partly sponsored by IQE Ltd. His research centres around silicon-perovskite tandem solar cells.
This highly promising technology combines emerging perovskite photovoltaics with industrially mature silicon devices. In tandem devices each sub-cell absorbs different wavelengths of light to more efficiently utilise the solar spectrum allowing such devices to exceed the efficiency limit for single junction devices.
Using technologies developed at IQE ltd to produce ultra-thin silicon wafers, Michael’s research aims to create lightweight, low material/energy usage, flexible devices which also benefit from the improved performance of silicon-perovskite tandems.
Michael received a BSc in Physics from the University of Leeds in 2011 and worked in industrial R&D and process development in the power semiconductor and automotive electronics industries prior to joining SPECIFIC.
ScaleUp and Processing Research Team
Logu Thirumalaisamy is working as a Royal Society-SERB Newton International Fellow at SPECIFIC, Materials Research Centre, Swansea University, United Kingdom.
He received his undergraduate, postgraduate, and Ph.D. degree (Physics) from Madurai Kamaraj University, India. He did part of his Ph.D. research work at Washington University, St. Louis, USA through Bhaskara Advanced Solar Energy Fellowship. He completed his first postdoctoral research at RCAST, The University of Tokyo, Japan. His research interests mainly focus on chalcopyrite and metal oxide thin films for energy conversion devices (solar cells and solar fuel cells) and Gas sensors.
Scale Up and Processing Research Team
Carys is a PhD student in Professor Watson’s research group. Funded by the SUNRISE project, she works on printed mesoscopic carbon perovskite solar cells (CPSCs).
Thus far her work has focussed on examining and optimising alternative green solvent systems for CPSCs, as well as exploring potential additives for the performance enhancement of stable AVA0.03MAPbI3 devices. She has experience in a variety of testing and characterisation techniques, including cross sectional infiltration analysis, X-ray diffraction, UV-vis spectroscopy, External Quantum Efficiency measurements and contact angle testing.
Before starting her PhD Carys completed a masters’ degree (MChem) at the University of Bath, where she helped work on developing liquid crystal templates for producing ultrathin metal nanowires.