Menu
MapConnectionsTopicsBulgariaThe Night (K-TRIO)Marie Skłodowska-CurieFor studentsFor teachersMethodologySurprise me
H2020Doctoral network2016–2021

SEPOMO · Spins for Efficient Photovoltaic Devices based on Organic Molecules

Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions

Duration
2016-11-01 → 2021-04-30
EU contribution
€3,823,989
Participants
11
Scheme
MSCA-ITN-ETN

Lines connect the coordinator with its partners.

Results in brief

Spins for Efficient Photovoltaic Devices based on Organic Molecules

Organic solar cells have the potential to become an environmental friendly, inexpensive, large area and flexible photovoltaics technology. Their main advantages are low process temperatures, the potential for very low cost due to abundant materials and scalable processing, and the possibility of producing flexible devices on plastic substrates. To improve their commercialization capacity and to complement other renewable energy technologies, the performance of state-of-the-art organic solar cells needs to be further improved. Our goals within ITN SEPOMO – Spins in Efficient Photovoltaic devices based on Organic Molecules – have been to bring the performance of organic solar cells forward by taking advantage of the so far unexplored degree of freedom of photogenerated species in organic materials, their spin. This challenging idea has provided a unified platform for the recruitment and training of 16 talented Early Stage Researchers for a career in science and technology and to promote the world-wide position of Europe in the field of organic photovoltaics and electronics. Our scientific objectives have been to develop several novel routes to enhance the efficiency of organic solar cells by understanding and exploiting the electronic spin interactions.

Data: CORDIS, © European Union

Project objective

Organic solar cells (OSCs) have the potential to become an environmental friendly, inexpensive, large area and flexible photovoltaics technology. Their main advantages are low process temperatures, the potential for very low cost due to abundant materials and scalable processing, and the possibility of producing flexible devices on plastic substrates. To improve their commercialization capacity, to compete with established power generation and to complement other renewable energy technologies, the performance of state-of-the-art OSCs needs to be further improved.Our goals within SEPOMO – Spins in Efficient Photovoltaic devices based on Organic Molecules – are to bring the performance of OSCs forward by taking advantage of the so far unexplored degree of freedom of photogenerated species in organic materials, their spin. This challenging idea provides a unified platform for the excellent research to promote the world-wide position of Europe in the field of organic photovoltaics and electronics, and to train strongly motivated early stage researchers (ESRs) for a career in science and technology oriented industry that is rapidly growing. Our scientific objectives are to develop several novel routes to enhance the efficiency of OSC by understanding and exploiting the electronic spin interactions. This will allow us to address crucial bottlenecks in state-of-the-art OSCs: we will increase the quantum efficiency by reducing the dominant recombination losses and by enhancing the light harvesting and exciton generation, e.g. by means of internal upconversion of excited states. Our ESRs will be trained within this interdisciplinary (physics, chemistry, engineering) and intersectoral (academia, R&D center, enterprise) consortium in highly relevant fundamental yet application-oriented research with the potential to commercialise the results. The hard and soft skills learned in our network are central for the ESRs to pursue their individual careers in academics or industry.

Original text from CORDIS.

Participants

  • RIJKSUNIVERSITEIT GRONINGEN · GroningenCoordinatorNetherlands
  • AGENCIA ESTATAL CONSEJO SUPERIOR DE INVESTIGACIONES CIENTIFICAS · MadridSpain
  • FUNDACIO EURECAT · Cerdanyola Del Valles (Barcelona)Spain
  • HELIATEK GMBH · DRESDENGermany
  • JULIUS-MAXIMILIANS-UNIVERSITAT WURZBURG · WuerzburgGermany
  • MERCK CHEMICALS LTD · HULLUnited Kingdom
  • TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAET CHEMNITZ · ChemnitzGermany
  • TECHNISCHE UNIVERSITAET DRESDEN · DresdenGermany
  • THE CHANCELLOR, MASTERS AND SCHOLARS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD · OxfordUnited Kingdom
  • UNIVERSITE D'ANGERS · Angers Cedex 01France
  • UNIVERSITE DE MONS · MonsBelgium

Links

Data: CORDIS, © European Union