In situ studies of organic solar cells

In the search for novel renewable energy sources an increasing interest is devoted to the development of innovative photovoltaic systems able to convert solar energy into electricity. Organic photovoltaic devices (OPV) are very promising for their low fabrica-tion cost, low environmental impact and elevated flexibility. The research group at ISM applies non-conventional in-situ charac-terization tools to control, at the nanometer scale, the properties and stability of the organic materials constituting the active elements of the devices, aiming at a deeper understanding of the processes associated with the energetic conversion and the device aging, a knowledge that is the basis of novel realization strategies. As an example, the studies performed at ISM show that the introduction of plasmonic nanoparticles inside the photoactive layer of OPV devices allowing for an enhancement of the device efficiency also produces an improvement of  the cell stability, allowing for better preservation of the photovoltaic performances over time.

Staff: Barbara Paci, Amanda Generosi, Valerio Rossi Albertini, Marco Guaragno