Organic Solar Cells (organic photovoltaics - OPVs) and related thin film solar cells are based on materials which ultimately may be produced in large areas at extremely low cost, with high efficiencies and long lifetimes. OPVs are envisioned based on photoactive molecular semiconductors, semiconducting polymers, and/or hybrids of these materials with nanocrystalline semiconductors and oxides. These materials must typically form chemically and physically robust interfaces with oxides, metals, and (more recently) carbon-based transparent electrical contacts: as well as moisture and oxygen barrier layers. Dramatic improvements in OPV energy conversion efficiencies will not be possible without a molecular-level understanding and optimization of electron-transfer events, and physical and chemical interactions, which dominate all of the interfaces present in these thin film devices.
Mission Statement
The Center for Interface Science: Solar-Electric Materials (CIS:SEM) will become a national resource for:
- understanding and controlling the interface science underlying solar energy conversion technologies based on organic and organic-inorganic hybrid materials;
- inspiring, recruiting and training future scientists and leaders in the basic science of solar electric energy conversion.