Motivated by the opportunity to address the challenges of toxicity and instability affecting lead-halide perovskites, researchers have been turning their attention to the development of new inorganic solar absorbers. With advances in the fields of metal halides, chalcogenides, and chalcohalides, a plethora of promising photovoltaic absorbers has been discovered, and their properties have been increasingly well understood. This exciting class of materials includes double perovskites (A2BB’X6), ABZ2 semiconductors, rudorffites, chalcogenide perovskites (ABS3), heavy pnictogen chalcogenides, and chalcohalides. Our symposium aims to facilitate a comprehensive discussion among experts in the fabrication, simulation, and characterization of this emerging class of semiconducting materials. By bringing together a range of different perspectives and skill sets, we hope to promote a deeper understanding of these new solar absorbers and to accelerate their development. We invite contributions that cover a broad range of topics, including fabrication methods (such as solution processing and thermal evaporation), characterization and the development of structure-properties relations, and photophysical studies.
- Synthesis and material development of emerging inorganic photoabsorbers
- Dry and wet thin-film processing techniques of emerging inorganic photoabsorbers
- Structural characterization and development of structure-properties relations
- Theoretical predictions of novel inorganic materials
- Charge-carrier dynamics and transport in novel inorganic materials
- Fabrication of Optoelectronic Devices
Laura Herz is a Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford. She received her PhD in Physics from the University of Cambridge in 2002 and was a Research Fellow at St John's College Cambridge from 2001 - 2003 after which she moved to Oxford. Her research interests lie in the area of organic and organic/inorganic hybrid semiconductors including aspects such as self-assembly, nano-scale effects, energy-transfer and light-harvesting for solar energy conversion.
This symposium brings together leading researchers, scientists, and industry professionals to discuss the latest developments in the circular economy for energy materials. With the increasing deployment of sustainable energy technologies, it is critical to explore the security of supply chains and how the devices will be handled at the end of life. For example, PV waste generation by 2050 is estimated to be above 70 million tonnes according to IRENA (S. Weckend, et al., IRENA/IEA-PVPS, 978-92-95111-99-8, (2016)) The discussions will focus on key aspects of resource efficiency, circularity by design, metrics and assessments, traceability and policy. Attendees will also gain insights into the latest advancements in sustainable approaches to renewable energy materials and their role in achieving a circular economy to support the transition to net zero. The session will align with the following UN SDGs: GOAL 7: Affordable and Clean Energy, GOAL 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure, GOAL 12: Responsible Consumption and Production.
This symposium aims to inspire new ideas and collaborations that will propel advancements in efficient and sustainable renewable energy technologies, accelerating the global transition towards a cleaner, more sustainable future. We invite researchers of different career stages and expertise, students, and industry professionals from around the world to join us for what promises to be an informative and exciting symposium on the latest developments in sustainable energy materials.
- LCA & circular economy
- Existing PV tech
- Emerging PV tech
- Energy storage
Bening pursued his PhD degree at Interdisciplinary Graduate School, Nanyang Technological University (NTU), Singapore. Specifically, he spent four years working at Energy Research Institute @ NTU (ERIAN) under supervisions of Assoc Prof Leong Wei Lin and Assoc Prof Andrew Grimsdale with the aim to improve interfacial and bulk stabilities of perovskite solar cells.
Bening obtained MSc degree in polymer materials from The University of Manchester and BSc (Hons) in Chemistry and Biological Chemistry with Minor in Physics from NTU. Currently, he works as Research Associate in Emerging Photovoltaics at Energy Materials Lab, Newcastle University, UK.
Achieving efficient perovskite based solar cells requires a comprehensive understanding of the performance limiting processes. This symposium covers the optical characterization of the state-of-the-art solar cells evaluating the photophysical properties. The aim is to unravel the critical components for further optimization and elucidate various parameters influencing the photophysics of solar cells. This will aid the understanding of charge generation and recombination and provide future design rules for efficient and stable devices towards commercialization. We invite contributions targetting the device efficiency, optical transient spectroscopy, evaluation of interfacial recombination, selectivity of various charge collection layers and their limitations.
- Perovskite solar cells
- Photophysics of hybrid devices
- Optical spectroscopy of perovskite solar cells
- Charge Recombination in perovskite solar cells
- Photophysics of hybrid solar cells
Wolfgang Tress is currently working as a scientist at LPI, EPFL in Switzerland, with general interests in developing and studying novel photovoltaic concepts and technologies. His research focuses on the device physics of perovskite solar cells; most recently, investigating recombination and hysteresis phenomena in this emerging material system. Previously, he was analyzing and modeling performance limiting processes in organic solar cells.
Giulia is Associate Professor at Physical Chemistry Unit at University of Pavia, leading the PVsquared2 team, and running the European Grant ERCStG Project “HYNANO”aiming at the development of advanced hybrid perovskites materials and innovative functional interfaces for efficient, cheap and stable photovoltaics. Within this field, Giulia contributed to reveal the fundamental lightinduced dynamical processes underlying the operation of such advanced optoelectronic devices whose understanding is paramount for a smart device development and for contributing to the transition of a green economy.
Giulia received an MS in Physical Engineering in 2008 and obtained her PhD in Physics cum laude in 2012 at the Politecnico of Milan. Her experimental thesis focused on the realisation of a new femtosecond-microscope for mapping the ultrafast phenomena at organic interfaces. During her PhD, she worked for one year at the Physics Department of Oxford University where she pioneered new concepts within polymer/oxide solar cell technology. From 2012-2015, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology in Milan. In 2015, she joined the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) with a Co-Funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship. From 2016 to 2019, she has been awarded by the Swiss Ambizione Energy Grant providing a platform to lead her independent research group at EPFL focused on the developemnt of new generation hybrid perovskite solar cells.
She is author of 90 peer-reviewed scientific papers bringing her h-index to 44 (>13’000 citations), focused on developement and understanding of the interface physics which governs the operation of new generation solar cells.
Recently, she received the USERN prize in Physical Science, the Swiss Physical Society Award in 2018 for Young Researcher and the IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Optics. She is currently USERN Ambassador for Italy and board member of the Young Academy of Europe.
More can be found at https://pvsquared2.unipv.it.
Weblink: https://people.epfl.ch/giulia.grancini?lang=en
Laura Herz is a Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford. She received her PhD in Physics from the University of Cambridge in 2002 and was a Research Fellow at St John's College Cambridge from 2001 - 2003 after which she moved to Oxford. Her research interests lie in the area of organic and organic/inorganic hybrid semiconductors including aspects such as self-assembly, nano-scale effects, energy-transfer and light-harvesting for solar energy conversion.
Chirality arises from the spatial arrangement of building blocks such that the final structure is not superimposable with its mirror image. In molecules and materials that result in the appearance of optical activity, as was famously demonstrated over a century ago by Pasteur through the correlation of crystal shapes with left and right rotations of plane-polarized light. Nowadays, the ability to break the symmetry of building blocks through chemistry and nanofabrication provides a wide range of nanomaterials and nanostructures exhibiting circular dichroism and birefringence, polarized photoluminescence, and electron transport. There is a growing interest in understanding the emergence of chiral response, its optimization, and applications. The Chiral24 symposium aims to bring together leading scientists exploring the synthesis, structure, and properties of chiral nanomaterials through experiments and simulations.
- Synthesis and self-assembly of chiral nanomaterials
- Chiral surface modification of nanocrystals
- Optical activity of plasmons, excitons, and charge carriers (CD, polarized photoluminescence, spin-polarized electron transport)
- Applications of chiral phenomena in optoelectronics (hybrid organic-inorganic semiconductors, chiral photodetectors, light sources, and transistors)
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Alicia Forment-Aliaga (Valencia, 1976) is a researcher at the Molecular Science Institute (ICMol) and a senior lecturer in the School of Chemistry at the University of Valencia (UVEG), Spain. She graduated in Chemistry and carried out her PhD on molecular magnetism at the UVEG, supervised by Prof. E. Coronado and Prof. F.M. Romero. Between 2004-2008 she joined Prof. K. Kern’s group as a postdoctoral researcher at Max-Planck Institute for Solid Sate Research in Stuttgart, Germany. During this period, she was awarded with different competitive postdoctoral grants for developing her research on molecular electronics. Since July 2008 she works at ICMol at the UVEG, in Prof. E. Coronado’s group. This period comprises a postdoctoral Juan de la Cierva contract and a tenure-track Ramón y Cajal contract, both competitive contracts granted by the Spanish Government, and her current position as senior lecturer. At the ICMol she has developed a line of research in molecular surface engineering and in the last years, she has also started working on 2D materials. Particularly, she has driven her research into four specific goals: (1) Non-conventional lithographies for the organization of molecular systems; (2) formation of self-assembled monolayers for molecular spintronics; (3) scanning force microscopies for surface modification and characterization and (4) 2D materials, targeting their exfoliation, molecular functionalization and application in different areas.
Prof. R. Robinson received his PhD in Applied Physics from Columbia University. After his PhD, Prof. Robinson was awarded a postdoctoral fellowship at University of California, Berkeley/LBNL in the research group of Paul Alivisatos. There, he worked on nanoparticle synthesis, chemical transformations of nanoparticles, and advanced property characterizations of nanoparticles. In 2008 Richard began a faculty position at Cornell University in the Materials Science Department, and is currently an associate professor. His primary research interests are: (I) Synthesis and chemical transformations in nanocrystals, (II) Nanocrystals in energy applications, and (III) Synchrotron x-ray characterization of nanomaterials.
therobinsongroup.org/
Sara Skrabalak received her B.A. in chemistry from Washington University in St. Louis in 2002 where she conducted research with Professor William E. Buhro. She then moved to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign where she completed her Ph.D. in chemistry in fall of 2006 under the tutelage of Professor Kenneth S. Suslick. After conducting postdoctoral research at the University of Washington – Seattle with Professors Younan Xia and Xingde Li, she began on the faculty at Indiana University – Bloomington in 2008. She is currently a James H. Rudy Professor at Indiana University. She was appointed Editor-in-Chief for the ACS journals Chemistry of Materials and ACS Materials Letters in 2020.
She is a recipient of both NSF CAREER and DOE Early Career Awards. She is a 2012 Research Corporation Cottrell Scholar, a 2013 Sloan Research Fellow, a 2014 Camille Dreyfus Teacher-Scholar and 2017 Guggenheim and Fulbright Fellows. In 2014, she received the ACS Award in Pure Chemistry and in 2017 was the recipient of the Frontiers in Research Excellence & Discovery Award from Research Corporation. She served as an Associate Editor for the RSC journals Nanoscale from 2017-2020 and Nanoscale Horizons from 2018-2020. Her group is developing new synthetic methods to solid materials with defined shapes and architecture then studying the properties of the materials as they are applied to applications in energy science, chemical sensing, and secured electronics.
This symposium aims to bring together key academic and industrial researchers in the field of to discuss the remaining challenges to advance the status of organic photovoltaics to a mature technology. Rather than focusing on performance materials that demonstrate high efficiency in lab-scale devices only, a high priority will be set to materials and process developments that facilitate the upscaling of lab cells to large-area modules with reduced losses. Key R&D aspects that demand more attention from an industrial and product development perspective may be found along the whole value chain. Relevant topics include, for instance, the scale-up synthesis of photoactive, interlayer and electrode materials, rapid material screening methodologies, interconnect strategies and module layout, roll-to-roll manufacturing and in-line characterisation techniques, module lifetime studies, aesthetical aspects, or new application sectors for OPV.
- Scaling-up of functional materials for OPV
- Synthetic complexity of OPV materials
- Roll-to-roll processable interlayers and electrodes
- Advanced manufacturing processes, high throughput screening and characterisation techniques
- Device engineering, module layout, panel customisation
- Operational stability of OPV, field studies
- Transparency and colour in OPV: materials, management, quality, and assessment
- Niche markets for OPV
Mariano Campoy Quiles´s research is devoted to the understanding and development of solution processed semiconductors for energy and optoelectronic applications. He and his team have built substantial research efforts in two application areas, solar photovoltaic (light to electric) and thermoelectric (heat to electric) energy conversion based on organic and hybrid materials. He studied physics at the Univesity of Santiago de Compostela, obtained his PhD in experimental physics from Imperial College London, and since 2008 he leads his team at the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona.
Morten Madsen, Professor wsr at the University of Southern Denmark, SDU NanoSYD.
My field of expertise is thin-film growth, integration and devices for energy conversion and storage applications. In 2010-2011, I worked with high performance transistors from III-V nanoscale membranes at the Javey research lab, UC Berkeley, California. In 2011, I established the OPV group at SDU NanoSYD, where we work on improving the performance and stability of organic and hybrid solar cells, including thin film synthesis, metal oxide interlayers and interfaces, organic and hybrid active layers as well as film and device degradation. Since 2016, we also have a focus on device up-scaling through Roll-to-Roll (R2R) printing technology at the SDU R2R facility. Vist out site for more details:
https://www.sdu.dk/en/om_sdu/institutter_centre/c_nanosyd/forskningsomrader/organic+solar+cells
RnD manager at Epishine AB
www.epishine.com
The power conversion efficiency of single-junction solar cells is limited by transmission and thermalization losses. (Sensitized) triplet fusion and singlet fission has emerged as promising strategies to circumvent these efficiency losses in solar cells. Some major challenges remain, including; development of (near-)infrared absorbing sensitizer materials for triplet fusion and infrared emitter materials for singlet fission, improved organic materials for singlet fission and triplet fusion, fundamental understanding of excitonic conversion processes, energy migration, and energy transfer across hybrid interfaces, as well as device integration. The symposium will bring together experts in singlet fission and triplet fusion to discuss fundamental understanding of the excitonic conversion processes and development of new materials towards solar energy applications.
- Fundamentals of singlet fission and triplet fusion
- Understanding energy migration and energy transfer across hybrid interfaces
- Novel organic and inorganic materials for (sensitized) triplet fusion and singlet fission
- Nontoxic and abundant materials
- Role of molecular oxygen
- Device implementation for solar cells and solar fuels
Felix (Phil) Castellano earned a B.A. in Chemistry from Clark University in 1991 and a Ph.D. in Chemistry from Johns Hopkins University in 1996. Following an NIH Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Maryland, School of Medicine, he accepted a position as Assistant Professor at Bowling Green State University in 1998. He was promoted to Associate Professor in 2004, to Professor in 2006, and was appointed Director of the Center for Photochemical Sciences in 2011. In 2013, he moved his research program to North Carolina State University where he is currently the Goodnight Innovation Distinguished Chair. He was appointed as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry (FRSC) in 2015. His current research focuses on metal-organic chromophore photophysics and energy transfer, photochemical upconversion phenomena, solar fuels photocatalysis, energy transduction at semiconductor/molecular interfaces, photoredox catalysis, and excited state electron transfer processes.
Seiichiro Izawa is an associate professor in Tokyo Institute of Technology in Japan, since 2023. He received his Ph.D. from Department of Applied Chemistry in the University of Tokyo in 2015 and worked at RIKEN in Japan and University of California, Santa Barbara as a postdoctoral fellow, and Institute for Molecular Science in Japan as an assistant professor. His research interests are optoelectronic properties at organic semiconductor interface for efficient organic electronics devices such as photovoltaics and light-emitting diodes.
From 2019, A.M. serves as Associate Professor in Condensed Matter Physics at Department of Materials Science. His research is focused on the development of advanced hybrid functional nanomaterials for applications in photonics and theranostics in collaboration with several national and international universities and research institutes. He started his research by working on hybrid organic/inorganic light NIR emitters based on lanthanides ions and photonic crystals for lighting and telecom, in the framework of several national and international project and networks. The topic of the current research is the design and study of advanced materials and nanostructured materials for photon managing and scintillation applications. The experimental activity is centered on CW and ultrafast TRPL photoluminescence spectroscopy, transient absorption spectroscopy, confocal imaging, IR and FT-IR spectroscopy to tackle both fundamental and applicative aspects aimed at the development of materials to implemented real-world technologies.
Metal halide perovskites (MHPs) are attracting a great interest in several optoelectronic applications due to their superior optical properties and their rich structural and chemical tunability. Their high extinction coefficients, optimal band gaps, high photoluminescence quantum yields, and long electron–hole diffusion lengths make them suitable candidates in photocatalytic applications. As a matter of fact, MHPs have been successfully applied in the field of water splitting, CO2 reduction, pollutant degradation, and organic synthesis. Together with these promising results several issues related to their instability have partially restricted their widespread application in photocatalysis and, at the same time, a more detailed investigation of the mechanism underlying their photocatalytic activity is required. This symposium explores the synthesis, properties, and applications of MHPs in the field of photocatalysis. We invite contributions discussing novel and optimized perovskites and heterojunctions including perovskites, challenges associated with stability issues, structure, property relationships, modelling of the photocatalytic mechanisms and further expansion of the scope of MHPs use in photocatalysis.
- Use of metal halide perovskites in photocatalysis
- Challenges in material stability
- Applications: water splitting, CO2 reduction, pollutant degradation, and organic synthesis
https://www.uniba.it/it/docenti/listorti-andrea
Lorenzo obtained his PhD in Chemistry in 2003 and since 2008 is Assistant Professor at the Chemistry Department of the University of Pavia. In 2021 he was appointed Full Professor in the same department. He was the recipient of the Young Scientist Award for outstanding work in the field of perovskites at the International Conference on Perovskites held in late 2005 in Zürich, of the “Alfredo di Braccio” Prize for Chemistry 2008 of Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei awarded to distinguished under 35-year-old chemists and contributed the Journal Materials Chemistry and Chemical Communications“Emerging Investigator” issues in 2010 and 2011. He is working in several areas of solid state chemistry with particular interest in the investigation of structure–properties correlation in different kinds of functional materials, in particular electrolyte materials for clean energy, hybrid organic-inorganic perovskites and catalysis materials. He is author of more than 200 papers on international peer-reviewed journals. Since 2018 he is member of Academic Senate and Vice-Director of the Chemistry Department. He is Director of the INSTM Reference Center “PREMIO” devoted to the synthesis of innovative materials and member of the Directive Board of INSTM. Since 2014 he is member of the Academic Board of the PhD in Chemistry of Pavia University. He is Editor of Journal of Physics and Chemistry of Solids.
Filippo De Angelis is senior research scientist and a deputy director at the CNR Institute of Molecular Sciences and Technology, in Perugia, Italy. He is the founder and leader of the Computational Laboratory for Hybrid/Organic Photovoltaics. He earned a BS in Chemistry in 1996 and a PhD in Theoretical Inorganic Chemistry in 1999, both from the University of Perugia. He is an expert in the development and application of quantum mechanical methods to the study of hybrid/organic photovoltaics and materials for energy applications. He is Fellow of the European Academy of Sciences. He has published >270 papers with > 17000 citations.
Haowei Huang graduated and received his Ph.D. in Bioscience Engineering from the Centre for Membrane Separations, Adsorption, Catalysis and Spectroscopy for Sustainable Solutions, KU Leuven (Belgium), in 2020, where he studied metal halide perovskite photocatalysis. After that, he continued his postdoctoral research with financial support from the Belgium government (FWO) with Prof.Maarten Roeffaers at KU Leuven and Prof. Peidong Yang at UC Berkeley. His research focuses on the development of optically active materials and their application on photo(electro)catalysis.

In stark contrast to their 3D counterparts, two-dimensional (2D) halide perovskites can incorporate a large library of organic compounds,[En. Environ. Sci. 13, 1154] enabling the design of materials with tailored properties and functionalities. For example, fluorination of the organic spacers was reported to improve the material’s stability upon exposure to moisture,[Chem. Mater. 30, 8211] while the development of chiral spacers enabled unique spin-selectivity with immense possibilities for spintronics.[Nat. Comm., 12, 4982] Alternatively, the use of conjugated organic spacers allows to realise new functionalities, associated to charge/energy transfer processes between the organic and inorganic components.[Nat. Chem. 11, 1152; Inorg. Chem. 38, 26, 6246]. While 2D perovskites have already found applications in solar cells, LEDs and FETs, their incredible chemical versatility makes them a unique platform to not only study their fundamental photophysics, but also develop entirely new types of devices. For example, recently mobile trions have been demonstrated in 2D perovskites, opening the path to new applications such as exciton transistors.[10.1002/adma.202210221] This symposium aims to bring together experts from the fields of synthetic chemistry, spectroscopy, photophysics, device design and simulations to fully unleash the potential of 2D perovskites.
- Organic cations for 2D perovskites
- Film formation processes
- Photophysics of 2D perovskites
- Chirality and spin-selectivity
- Applications of 2D perovskites in solar cells
- Applications of 2D perovskites in LED
- Applications of 2D perovskites in FET
- Stability of 2D perovskites and related devices
- Theory and simulations
Since 2019, Yana Vaynzof holds the Chair for Emerging Electronic Technologies at the Technical University of Dresden. Prior to that (2014-2019), she was a juniorprofessor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, Heidelberg University (Germany). She received a B.Sc degree (summa cum laude) in electrical engineering from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology (Israel) in 2006, and a M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University, (USA) in 2008. She pursued a Ph.D. degree in physics under the supervision of Prof. Sir. Richard Friend at the Optoelectronics Group, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge (UK), and investigated the development of hybrid polymer solar cells and the improvement of their efficiency and stability. Upon completing her PhD in 2011, she joined the Microelectronics group at the University of Cambridge as a Postdoctoral Research Associate focusing on the research of surfaces and interfaces in organic and hybrid optoelectronics. Yana Vaynzof was the recipient of a number of fellowships and awards, including the ERC Starting Grant, Gordon Y. Wu Fellowship, Henry Kressel Fellowship, Fulbright-Cottrell Award and the Walter Kalkhof-Rose Memorial Prize.
Volker Blum is an Associate Professor in the Thomas Lord Department of Mechanical Engineering and Materials Science at Duke University, Durham, NC. He obtained his doctoral degree from University of Erlangen, Germany in 2001 and then pursued his post-doctoral research at National Renewable Energy Laboratory in Golden, CO, from 2002-2004. From 2004-2013, he was a scientist and group leader at the Fritz Haber Institute in Berlin, Germany. He develops computational methods and software for electronic structure simulations, data analysis and data sharing in materials science and in computational chemistry, including as the lead developer of the FHI-aims electronic structure code. His current applied research focuses on novel semiconductor materials as well as molecular spectroscopy. In particular, his group is working on hybrid perovskite materials and chalcogenide semiconductors.
Giulia is Associate Professor at Physical Chemistry Unit at University of Pavia, leading the PVsquared2 team, and running the European Grant ERCStG Project “HYNANO”aiming at the development of advanced hybrid perovskites materials and innovative functional interfaces for efficient, cheap and stable photovoltaics. Within this field, Giulia contributed to reveal the fundamental lightinduced dynamical processes underlying the operation of such advanced optoelectronic devices whose understanding is paramount for a smart device development and for contributing to the transition of a green economy.
Giulia received an MS in Physical Engineering in 2008 and obtained her PhD in Physics cum laude in 2012 at the Politecnico of Milan. Her experimental thesis focused on the realisation of a new femtosecond-microscope for mapping the ultrafast phenomena at organic interfaces. During her PhD, she worked for one year at the Physics Department of Oxford University where she pioneered new concepts within polymer/oxide solar cell technology. From 2012-2015, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology in Milan. In 2015, she joined the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) with a Co-Funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship. From 2016 to 2019, she has been awarded by the Swiss Ambizione Energy Grant providing a platform to lead her independent research group at EPFL focused on the developemnt of new generation hybrid perovskite solar cells.
She is author of 90 peer-reviewed scientific papers bringing her h-index to 44 (>13’000 citations), focused on developement and understanding of the interface physics which governs the operation of new generation solar cells.
Recently, she received the USERN prize in Physical Science, the Swiss Physical Society Award in 2018 for Young Researcher and the IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Optics. She is currently USERN Ambassador for Italy and board member of the Young Academy of Europe.
More can be found at https://pvsquared2.unipv.it.
Weblink: https://people.epfl.ch/giulia.grancini?lang=en
Dr. Jovana V. Milić obtained her PhD in the Department of Chemistry and Applied Biosciences at ETH Zurich in July 2017. Her research interests encompass (supra)molecular engineering of bioinspired organic materials with the aim of developing functional nanotechnologies. Since October 2017, she has worked as a scientist with Prof. Michael Graetzel in the Laboratory for Photonics and Interfaces at EPFL in Switzerland on the development of novel photovoltaic materials, with the focus on dye-sensitized and hybrid perovskite solar cells. In September 2020, she has taken on a position of a Group Leader in the Soft Matter Physics Group of the Adolphe Merkle Institute at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland. For more information, refer to her LinkedIn profile (linkedin.com/in/jovanavmilic), ORCID 0000-0002-9965-3460, and Twitter (@jovana_v_milic).
Omer Yaffe is a senior scientist (assistant professor) at the Weizmann Institute of Science.
He investigates the structure-function relationship in functional materials such as semiconductors, ionic-conductors, and ferroelectrics. Specifically, he is interested in phenomena that stems from strongly anharmonic atomic displacements in solids.
He earned his Bachelor's degrees in chemistry and chemical engineering (dual-program) at Ben Gurion University in 2005, followed by a master’s degree in chemical engineering. In 2013, he earned a Ph.D. from the Weizmann Institute followed by a postdoctoral term at Columbia University, New York.
This symposium invites contributions on the emerging challenges to organic/perovskite-based transistor memoristors and synapses, including device performance and long-term stability, from the perspective of meterials design, device engineering, and memory characteriization. In addtion to the development of typical transistor-based memoristors, this symposium will further consider the electronic and photonic challenges of these devices in terms of mutiple memory behaviors, artificial synapses, and neuromorphic computing, as it is an emerging area of reasearch for Artificial Intelligence (AI). Any topics related to the developoment of organic/perovskite-based transistor memoristors and synapses are welcome.
- Transistor Memory
- Synapic Transistor
- Photomemory
Prof. Jung-Yao Chen received her Ph. D. in Chemical Engineering from National Taiwan University under the supervision of Prof. Wen-Chang Chen in 2016. She joined Prof. Alex Jen's research team at University of Washington in 2015. Currently, she is the assistant professor in Dept. of Photonics of National Cheng Kung University. Her research interests are the process design, morphology analysis and optoelectronic applications of photoactive material including conjugated polymer, phosphorescent material and perovskite. Recently, Prof. Jung-Yao Chen's research activity is focused on the developement of non-volatile photomemory on artificial synapses and photonic integrated circuits. The main objective is to explore the mechanisms behind the photo-recording functionality and develope ultrafast responsive photomemory with multi-level memory behavior.
Prof. Lee is an Associate Professor of Chemical Engineering and Biotechnology at Taipei Tech. He received his Ph.D. degree in Chemical Engineering from National Taiwan University in 2009. Prior to joining Taipei Tech, he continued his postdoc research at Stanford University from 2012 to 2014. He is devoted to the field of soft electronic materials. His present research interests covered stretchable polymer-based field-effect transistors, e-Skin, artificial synapses, non-volatile memory, and wearable electronics.


Tae-Woo Lee is an associate professor in Materials Science and Engineering at the Seoul National University, Korea. He received his Ph.D. in Chemical Engineering from the KAIST, Korea in 2002. He joined Bell Laboratories, USA as a postdoctoral researcher and worked at Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology as (2003-2008). He was an associate professor in Materials Science and Engineering at the Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), Korea until August 2016. His research focuses on printed flexible electronics based on organic, carbon, and organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite materials for displays, solar cells, and bio-inspired neuromorphic electronics.
Yong-Young Noh is Chair Professor in the Department of Chemical Engineering, Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), Pohang, Republic of Korea. He received his PhD in 2005 from GIST, Republic of Korea, and then worked at the Cavendish Laboratory in Cambridge, UK, as a postdoctoral associate. Afterwards, he worked at ETRI as a senior researcher, Hanbat National University as assistant professor, Dongguk University-Seoul as associate professor. He has won Merck Young Scientist Award (2013), Korea President Award (2014), IEEE George E. Smith Award (2014), and as selected this month Scientist from Korea Government (September. 2016). He has published over 360 papers in international journals in the field of materials for electronics and optoelectric devices, in particular, OFETs, OLEDs, Metal Halide, perovskites, carbon nanotube 2D layered materials and oxide TFTs.
Perovskite-based tandem solar cells have emerged as one of the most promising technologies for next-generation photovoltaics. Reported efficiencies for some representatives already surpass the Detailed Balance Limit for single junctions. This symposium aims to provide a platform that brings together the perspective of cutting edge fundamental research with visionaries from industry R&D to discuss the 1 , 2 and potentially 3 generation of perovskite tandem solar technology. As such, the symposium targets tandem technologies that combine perovskite with established solar technologies (e.g. silicon), as well as tandem concepts that are solely based on emerging technologies (all-perovskite, perovskite-organic, ...). A dedicated focus will also be on light management as well as challenges and prospects of 4-terminal tandem concepts. Further, the process of tandem solar cell commercialization will be addressed. Besides scaling up to larger areas, device stability is key for terawatt scale application. We hence will focus on issues that are intimately linked with the concept of tandem solar cell technology (challenges of wide and low-gap solar cells, impact of the interconnect, …). Finally, we want to open the floor to confer about the next step for perovskite-based multi-junction solar cell technologies starting with triple[1]junctions to entirely new concepts.
- Perovskite-Silicon Tandem Solar Cells
- All-Perovskite Tandem Solar Cells
- Perovskite-Organic Tandem Solar Cells
- Light Management in Perovskite Tandem Solar Cells
- 4-Terminal Perovskite Tandem Concepts
- Road Towards Commercialization: Upscaling, Stability and Outdoor Testing
- Beyond Two Junctions & Novel Tandem Concepts
Dr. Fan Fu is a group leader at Empa-Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees in materials science from the Wuhan University of Technology in 2010 and 2013, respectively. He joined Prof. Ayodhya N. Tiwari's group as a Ph.D. student in 2014 and earned his Ph.D. degree from ETH Zürich with distinction in 2017. His doctoral thesis on perovskite-CIGS thin-film tandem solar cells was awarded ETH Medal. From January 2018 to May 2019, he worked as a postdoc researcher in Prof. Christophe Ballif's group at EPFL. In June 2019, he joined Empa as a group leader. He is currently leading a research team investigating novel perovskite semiconductors for energy and optoelectronics applications. In particular, his group's recent research efforts focus on upscaling high-performance perovskite-based tandem solar cells and mini-modules on flexible substrates.
Laura Herz is a Professor of Physics at the University of Oxford. She received her PhD in Physics from the University of Cambridge in 2002 and was a Research Fellow at St John's College Cambridge from 2001 - 2003 after which she moved to Oxford. Her research interests lie in the area of organic and organic/inorganic hybrid semiconductors including aspects such as self-assembly, nano-scale effects, energy-transfer and light-harvesting for solar energy conversion.
René Janssen is university professor at the Eindhoven University of Technology (TU/e). He received his Ph.D. in 1987 from the TU/e for a thesis on electron spin resonance and quantum chemical calculations of organic radicals in single crystals. He was lecturer at the TU/e since 1984, and a senior lecturer in physical organic chemistry since 1991. In 1993 and 1994 he joined the group of Professor Alan J. Heeger (Nobel laureate in 2000) at the University of California Santa Barbara as associate researcher to work on the photophysical properties of conjugated polymers. Presently the research of his group focuses on functional conjugated molecules and macromolecules as well as hybrid semiconductor materials that may find application in advanced technological applications. The synthesis of new materials is combined with time-resolved optical spectroscopy, electrochemistry, morphological characterization and the preparation of prototype devices to accomplish these goals. René Janssen has co-authored more than 600 scientific papers. He is co-recipient of the René Descartes Prize from the European Commission for outstanding collaborative research, and received the Research Prize of The Royal Institute of Engineers and in The Netherlands for his work. In 2015 René Janssen was awarded with the Spinoza Prize of The Dutch Research Council.
Quantum engineering is a vital breeding ground for future key technologies, from quantum computing and energy-efficient optoelectronics to medical applications. However, the search for suitable material platforms is lagging. Guidelines in the search may be performance-based, e.g., related to the efficiency and reliability of quantum-state preparation, transfer, and read-out. On the other hand, a more widespread deployment of quantum technology may also need to consider aspects such as scalability, tunability, integrability, versatility, or cost-efficiency. In this respect, halide perovskites and their related compounds of various dimensionalities invite the question whether their solution-processability, spectral tunability, strong light-matter interaction, and generally intriguing set of optical and structural properties could indeed represent a suitable material platform for quantum-engineered devices.
- Synthesis of novel halide perovskites - from colloidal nanocrystals to bulk materials (1D, 2D, and 3D)
- Static and dynamic structural properties
- Photophysics
- Spin dynamics and coherence
- Control of light and matter via chirality and light polarization
- Polaritonics and strong light-matter interaction
- Quantum-enhanced microscopy
- Quantum-engineered devices, incl. quantum-light sources
Sascha is a Research Group Leader & Rowland Felllow at Harvard University's Rowland Institute for Science.
His group studies light-matter interactions to improve the efficiencies of solar cells, displays, and quantum applications for a sustainable energy future.
Maksym Kovalenko has been a tenure-track Assistant Professor of Inorganic Chemistry at ETH Zurich since July 2011 and Associate professor from January 2017. His group is also partially hosted by EMPA (Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology) to support his highly interdisciplinary research program. He completed graduate studies at Johannes Kepler University Linz (Austria, 2004-2007, with Prof. Wolfgang Heiss), followed by postdoctoral training at the University of Chicago (USA, 2008-2011, with Prof. Dmitri Talapin). His present scientific focus is on the development of new synthesis methods for inorganic nanomaterials, their surface chemistry engineering, and assembly into macroscopically large solids. His ultimate, practical goal is to provide novel inorganic materials for optoelectronics, rechargeable Li-ion batteries, post-Li-battery materials, and catalysis. He is the recipient of an ERC Consolidator Grant 2018, ERC Starting Grant 2012, Ruzicka Preis 2013 and Werner Prize 2016. He is also a Highly Cited Researcher 2018 (by Clarivate Analytics).
Luisa De Marco received her PhD in Nanoscience from Università del Salento in 2010 working on nanostructured semiconductors for photovoltaics. Since 2016 she is researcher at CNR NANOTEC leading a 4-person team working on the development of low-dimensional inorganic and hybrid nanomaterials. She is author of more than 60 papers that collectively have received more than 2000 citations, with an h-index of 27. Among the publications stand out Advanced Materials, Nature Nanotechnology, Energy & Environmental Science, ACS Nano and Science Advances.
Her research interests focus on the development and engineering of hybrid and inorganic low-dimensional semiconductors having specifically tailored functional properties and on design and fabrication of optoelectronic devices.
Jacky Even was born in Rennes, France, in 1964. He received the Ph.D. degree from the University of Paris VI, Paris, France, in 1992. He was a Research and Teaching Assistant with the University of Rennes I, Rennes, from 1992 to 1999. He has been a Full Professor of optoelectronics with the Institut National des Sciences Appliquées, Rennes,since 1999. He was the head of the Materials and Nanotechnology from 2006 to 2009, and Director of Education of Insa Rennes from 2010 to 2012. He created the FOTON Laboratory Simulation Group in 1999. His main field of activity is the theoretical study of the electronic, optical, and nonlinear properties of semiconductor QW and QD structures, hybrid perovskite materials, and the simulation of optoelectronic and photovoltaic devices. He is a senior member of Institut Universitaire de France (IUF).
Bio Professional Preparation M.S. in Chemistry, with Honours, University of Bari, Italy, 1996 Ph.D. in Chemistry, University of Bari, Italy, 2001 Research interests Prof. L. Manna is an expert of synthesis and assembly of colloidal nanocrystals. His research interests span the advanced synthesis, structural characterization and assembly of inorganic nanostructures for applications in energy-related areas, in photonics, electronics and biology.
Dr. Thilo Stöferle has been a permanent Research Staff Member at the IBM Research – Zurich Laboratory since August 2007. His current research interests are quantum simulation and quantum fluids, Bose-Einstein condensates with exciton-polaritons, integrated high Q/V cavities, nanophotonic lasers and switches. Another focus is on hybrid nanocomposite quantum materials for strong-light matter interaction and opto-electronic applications.
Kaifeng Wu obtained his B.S. degree in materials physics from University of Science and Technology of China (2010) and his PhD degree in physical chemistry from Emory University (2015). After his postdoc training at Los Alamos National Laboratory, he moved to China to start his independent research in 2017. His current work focuses on the ultrafast spectroscopy of carrier and spin dynamics in low-dimensional optoelectronic materials, as well as relevant applications in quantum information and energy conversion technologies. He is the winner of the 2022 Distinguished Lectureship Award by the Chemical Society of Japan, 2021 Future of Chemical Physics Lectureship Award by the American Physical Society, 2020 Chinese Chemical Society Prize for Young Scientists, 2019 Robin Hochstrasser Young Investigator Award by the Chemical Physics journal, and 2018 Victor K. LaMer Award by the American Chemical Society. He also serves as the Editorial Advisory Board of J. Phys. Chem. Lett.
Following the success of PerFut symposium at MatSus 2023, Perfut24 aims at becoming a platform to discuss the future research directions of the metal halide perovskite field, bringing together from fundamental research groups to industrial partners. While this family of materials is considered a solid candidate to develop future technologies, there is an increasing urge to overcome the technological problems that hinder their full commercial expansion, such as large area production, stability, and feasibility. On the other hand, the fundamental research that can become a key tool to solve these issues is also elucidating exciting new properties and frontier phenomena that suggest a vast potential beyond current objectives, including further halide perovskites applications, such as hot-carrier, multiband or multiple exciton generation photovoltaics. In this situation, the symposium PerFut24 will cover both the main topics related to halide perovskite technological applications, as well as the fundamental approaches that can facilitate this expansion and beyond. This combination will bring together a diverse community encouraging the proposal of versatile approaches to ensure the future of halide perovskites.
- Technological feasibility
- Optoelectronics applications
- Beyond optoelectronics: neuromorphic, detection…
- Materials processes and fabrication
- Perovskite materials fundamentals
- Frontier phenomena
Dr. Annalisa Bruno is a Principal Scientist at the Energy ResearchInstitute at Nanyang Technological University (ERI@N) coordinating a team working on perovskite high-efficiency solar cells and modules by thermal evaporation. Annalisa is also a tenured Scientist at Italian National Agency for New Technologies, Energy, and Sustainable Economic Development (ENEA). Previously Annalisa was a Post-Doctoral Research Associate at Imperial College London. Annalisa received her B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. Degrees in Physics from the University of Naples Federico II. Her research interests include perovskite light-harvesting and charge generation properties and their implementation in solar cells and optoelectronic devices.
Iván Mora-Seró (1974, M. Sc. Physics 1997, Ph. D. Physics 2004) is researcher at Universitat Jaume I de Castelló (Spain). His research during the Ph.D. at Universitat de València (Spain) was centered in the crystal growth of semiconductors II-VI with narrow gap. On February 2002 he joined the University Jaume I. From this date until nowadays his research work has been developed in: electronic transport in nanostructured devices, photovoltaics, photocatalysis, making both experimental and theoretical work. Currently he is associate professor at University Jaume I and he is Principal Researcher (Research Division F4) of the Institute of Advanced Materials (INAM). Recent research activity was focused on new concepts for photovoltaic conversion and light emission based on nanoscaled devices and semiconductor materials following two mean lines: quantum dot solar cells with especial attention to sensitized devices and lead halide perovskite solar cells and LEDs, been this last line probably the current hottest topic in the development of new solar cells.
Pablo P. Boix received his PhD. in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology from the Universitat Jaume I (2012, Castelló, Spain), with the focus on unveiling the physical processes governing optoelectronic devices such as dye sensitized, quantum dots and organic solar cells; as well as solar fuel systems. In 2012, he joined the Energy Research Institute (at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore), where he led a research line on hybrid lead halide perovskites for photovoltaic and light emission applications. As industrial R&D experience, in 2016, he worked on perovskite solar cells development (Dyesol Ltd., Lausanne, Switzerland). After that, Pablo joined ICMol (Universitat de València) as a Ramon y Cajal fellow. His research has contributed to the implementation of new materials and device concepts. As a result, his scientific production includes more than 70 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, with h-index: 39 (Web of Science) and 2 patents among others.


Juan Bisquert (pHD Universitat de València, 1991) is a Professor of applied physics at Universitat Jaume I de Castelló, Spain. He is the director of the Institute of Advanced Materials at UJI. He authored 360 peer reviewed papers, and a series of books including . Physics of Solar Cells: Perovskites, Organics, and Photovoltaics Fundamentals (CRC Press). His h-index 95, and is currently a Senior Editor of the Journal of Physical Chemistry Letters. He conducts experimental and theoretical research on materials and devices for production and storage of clean energies. His main topics of interest are materials and processes in perovskite solar cells and solar fuel production. He has developed the application of measurement techniques and physical modeling of nanostructured energy devices, that relate the device operation with the elementary steps that take place at the nanoscale dimension: charge transfer, carrier transport, chemical reaction, etc., especially in the field of impedance spectroscopy, as well as general device models. He has been distinguished in the 2014-2019 list of ISI Highly Cited Researchers.
Hendrik (Henk) Bolink obtained his PhD in Materials Science at the University of Groningen in 1997 under the supervision of Prof. Hadziioannou. After that he worked at DSM as a materials scientist and project manager in the central research and new business development department, respectively. In 2001 he joined Philips, to lead the materials development activity of Philips´s PolyLED project.
Since 2003 he is at the Instituto de Ciencia Molecular (ICMol )of the University of Valencia where he initiated a research line on molecular opto-eletronic devices. His current research interests encompass: inorganic/organic hybrid materials such as transition metal complexes and perovskites and their integration in LEDs and solar cells.
He obtained a Ph.D. (cum laude) in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, University of Valencia (Spain), 2017. He has over 6 years of experience in third generation photovoltaics, obtained at internationally recognized institutions. He joined Saule Technologies in 2017, and since July 2018 he is the Director Of Knowledge Management. He is leading a team involved in a broad range of activities such as; Business Development, Marketing, IP and Project Management and currently has a particular focus on product development for IoT applications.

Prof. Mónica Lira-Cantú is Group Leader of the Nanostructured Materials for Photovoltaic Energy Group at the Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (www.icn.cat located in Barcelona (Spain). She obtained a Bachelor in Chemistry at the Monterrey Institute of Technology and Higher Education, ITESM Mexico (1992), obtained a Master and PhD in Materials Science at the Materials Science Institute of Barcelona (ICMAB) & Autonoma University of Barcelona (1995/1997) and completed a postdoctoral work under a contract with the company Schneider Electric/ICMAB (1998). From 1999 to 2001 she worked as Senior Staff Chemist at ExxonMobil Research & Engineering (formerly Mobil Technology Co) in New Jersey (USA) initiating a laboratory on energy related applications (fuel cells and membranes). She moved back to ICMAB in Barcelona, Spain in 2002. She received different awards/fellowships as a visiting scientist to the following laboratories: University of Oslo, Norway (2003), Riso National Laboratory, Denmark (2004/2005) and the Center for Advanced Science and Innovation, Japan (2006). In parallel to her duties as Group Leader at ICN2 (Spain), she is currently visiting scientist at the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL, CH). Her research interests are the synthesis and application of nanostructured materials for Next-generation solar cells: Dye sensitized, hybrid, organic, all-oxide and perovskite solar cells. Monica Lira-Cantu has more than 85 published papers, 8 patents and 10 book chapters and 1 edited book (in preparation).
Bachelor in Chemistry from University of São Paulo (USP) in 1996, Master's Degree in Chemistry from University of Campinas (UNICAMP) in 1998 and Doctorate in Chemistry from UNICAMP in 2001 under the guidance of Prof. Marco-Aurelio De Paoli. Performed an internship during the Doctorate at Imperial College in London under the supervision of Prof. James R. Durrant. After completing his doctorate he also held a post-doctorate position at Imperial College in the same research group. In 2003, he held another postdoctoral program at USP under the supervision of Prof. Henrique Toma. He is currently Professor of the Chemistry Institute of UNICAMP. He has experience in the field of Chemistry, with emphasis in the application of nanomaterials in Solar Energy Conversion, working mainly in the following subjects: inorganic nanoparticles of chalcogenides and perovskite (quantum dots) in light emitting diodes (LED); photocatalytic oxide / graphene nanocomposites for the generation of hydrogen and direct conversion of CO2 into solar fuels; emerging solar cells (in particular TiO2 / dye cells and perovskite solar cells). In 2017 he held a sabbatical at SLAC-Stanford in the field of application of Synchrotron light in the characterization of materials for energy conversion. Published more than 115 papers, 3 patents, 1 book and 7 book chapters. She is the leader of the reserach on emerging photovoltaics in Latin America.
Efficient, sensitive and wavelength-selective light detection has become central to modern consumer electronics, and also in science and technology. Photodetectors based on crystalline inorganic elemental materials such as silicon and compound semiconductors are the core of today’s photodetectors. However, a new trend has begun: next generation semiconductors such as organics, perovskites, and nanocrystals are now becoming increasingly interesting candidates for low noise, color-selective, efficient photodetection. This symposium will focus on next-generation photodetectors. New materials, device architectures and characterisation protocols for photodetectors will be foci
- Perovskite photodetectors
- Organic photodetectors
- Nanocrystals and low dimensional systems for photodetection
- Color-selective and infrared photodetection
- Image sensors with new generation semiconductors
- Thermodynamic limit of the sensitivity of next generation photodetectors
- Photodetector characterisation methods
- Noise, from theory to experiment
- Photomultiplication and amplification
- New compound semiconductors for photodetection
- LiFi and optical wireless communication
- Special applications: X-ray detection, biological applications and wearable sensors
- Pixelation techniques and imaging
The quest for sustainable and renewable energy sources has led to significant advances in the development of advanced functional nanomaterials for energy conversion and storage with a particular emphasis on light-driven processes. The use of solar power to drive such energy conversion is quite appealing to develop efficient, cost-effective, and sustainable solutions to address the current energy and environmental crisis. This symposium will cover a wide range of topics related to photo-driven energy conversion and storage, including but not limited to photocatalysis, solar fuel generation, photovoltaics, and energy storage devices. It will delve into the fundamental understanding of light-matter interactions, the design and synthesis of novel photoactive materials, as well as the development of efficient devices for energy conversion and storage. By bringing together scientists from various disciplines, the symposium aims to foster interdisciplinary collaborations to advance the development of efficient photoactive energy technologies and drive the transition towards a greener and more sustainable future. It will also serve as a platform for young researchers and students to showcase their work and gain insights from established researchers.
- Design and development of new photoactive nanomaterials
- CO2 reduction
- Hydrogen generation
- Nitrogen reduction
- Methane conversion
- H2O2 generation
Dr. Villa obtained her PhD in Chemistry from the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Then, she worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research (IREC) on the conversion of methane to methanol and at the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) within an ERC-Proof-of-concept (MICROCLEANERS). In 2018, she joined the Advanced Functional Nanorobots center at the University of Chemistry and Technology (Czech Republic), where she worked as Senior Scientist for three years. Since 2021, she is leading a research group on advanced photocatalytic materials for energy and environmental applications at the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ).
Katherine has a strong multidisciplinary profile gained by working at 8 research centers, Colombia, Spain, Czech Republic, and Belgium. Her research areas span from water decontamination, hydrogen generation, selective oxidation processes to light-driven micro/nanoswimmers. She has received important recognitions (MSCA-UNIPD-COFUND, Beatriu de Pinós, Ramón y Cajal, la Caixa Junior Leader, etc) as well as national and international competitive funding, including an ERC Starting Grant 2022 for her project (PhotoSwim).
Her research interests include photocatalysis, nanomaterials, renewable energy, micro/nanomotors, and environmental remediation.
James Durrant is Professor of Photochemistry in the Department of Chemistry, Imperial College London and Ser Cymru Solar Professor, University of Swansea. His research addresses the photochemistry of new materials for solar energy conversion targeting both solar cells (photovoltaics) and solar to fuel (i.e.: artificial photosynthesis. It is based around employing transient optical and optoelectronic techniques to address materials function, and thereby elucidate design principles which enable technological development. His group is currently addressing the development and functional characterisation of organic and perovskite solar cells and photoelectrodes for solar fuel generation. More widely, he leads Imperial's Centre for Processable Electronics, founded the UK�s Solar Fuels Network and led the Welsh government funded S�r Cymru Solar initiative. He has published over 500 research papers and 5 patents, and was recently elected a Fellow of the Royal Society
Sophia Haussener is a Professor heading the Laboratory of Renewable Energy Science and Engineering at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL). Her current research is focused on providing design guidelines for thermal, thermochemical, and photoelectrochemical energy conversion reactors through multi-physics modelling and experimentation. Her research interests include: thermal sciences, fluid dynamics, charge transfer, electro-magnetism, and thermo/electro/photochemistry in complex multi-phase media on multiple scales. She received her MSc (2007) and PhD (2010) in Mechanical Engineering from ETH Zurich. She was a postdoctoral researcher at the Joint Center of Artificial Photosynthesis (JCAP) and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) between 2011 and 2012. She has published over 70 articles in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings, and 2 books. She has been awarded the ETH medal (2011), the Dimitris N. Chorafas Foundation award (2011), the ABB Forschungspreis (2012), the Prix Zonta (2015), the Global Change Award (2017), and the Raymond Viskanta Award (2019), and is a recipient of a Starting Grant of the Swiss National Science Foundation (2014).
Kevin Sivula obtained a PhD in chemical engineering from UC Berkeley in 2007. In 2011, after leading a research group in the Laboratory of Photonics and Interfaces at EPFL, he was appointed tenure track assistant professor. He now heads the Laboratory for Molecular Engineering of Optoelectronic Nanomaterials (http://limno.epfl.ch) at EPFL.
Sulfur cathodes are promising due to their high theoretical energy density, low price and improved sustainability and safety with respect to conventional lithium-ion batteries. However, several challenges need to be overcome before sulfur-based batteries can be deployed commercially. These challenges include the low utilization of active materials, a poor cycle life and low system efficiency. To overcome these challenges and achieve next-generation high-energy Li–S, Na-S or alternative S-based batteries, new components and further cell development and characterization are required.
- New composite nanomaterials as the cathode to enhance the battery cycle life and kinetics
- Anode materials and anode-electrolyte interface engineering
- Electrolytes and additives to improve electrochemical performance (and safety)
- Solid electrolytes (gels, solid polymers, inorganic ceramics and inorganic–organic composites)
- Insights into the sulfur reaction mechanism(s) using in situ or ex situ characterization techniques.
- Pouch cell manufacturing, including high-loading electrode fabrication, electrolyte filling or cell activation.
- Modeling of the electrochemical performance or aging mechanisms
- Recycling and self-healing of batteries and components
- Sustainable materials for sulfur-based batteries and life cycle assessment
Andreu Cabot received his PhD from the University of Barcelona in 2003. From 2004 to 2007, he worked as a postdoctoral researcher in Prof. A. Paul Alivisatos group in the University of California at Berkeley and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. In 2009 he joined the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research – IREC, where he is currently ICREA Research Professor. His research interests include the design and preparation of nanomaterials, the characterization of their functional properties and their use in energy technologies.
Pascale Chenevier is a research professor (« directrice de recherche ») at CEA in Grenoble, where she designs nanomaterials for the new technologies of energy (thermoelectrics, fuel cells, hydrogen production and batteries). She acquired her expertise in nanochemistry first in nanomedicine and biophysics, during her PhD at Bordeaux and a postdoc at Cornell University. Joining CEA in Paris-Saclay in 2003, she turned to printed electronics and electrocatalysis for hydrogen production. She started developing silicon-rich anode nanomaterials for batteries after her moving to Grenoble in 2013, and participated in the creation of a start-up company, Enwires, from 2014 to 2016. She is now part of a wide research team devoted to active material development and operando battery characterization for Li-ion, Li-S and solid-state batteries.
PhD in Planning and public policies for transition (energy, ecology and urban future). Current pratical mission for 2BoSS project: design a circular business model and sustainable supply chain to address multiple risks and impacts of 2BoSS next generation battery in its life cycle. Innovation & Ecosystem management; Scientific Divulgation and Events organisation for 2BoSS project at Cleopa Gmbh: https://www.cleopa.de/en/home-2/.
Christophe Aucher holds a doctorate in Energy and Material Sciences from both the University of Québec at Montréal (Canada, UQAM) and the Material Institute of Nantes (France, IMN). He is developing his career in the LEITAT R&D department since 2011. LEITAT is a private Technological Centre based in Barcelona and dedicated to R&D activities in the areas of biomedicine, biotechnologies, environment, surface treatments, material science, nanotechnology and energies with deep knowledge and experience in technological transfers to several industrial sectors. Christophe is leading the Energy Storage team working on solid state, lithium sulfur, metal air and lithium recovery. His team is currently involved in National and European initiatives for electrical mobility, stationary, printed electronic and batteries recycling.
Dr Jordi Jacas obtained his PhD in Materials at Sheffield University, working on the electrical and electrochemical characterisation of electrode materials for Li-ion batteries. During his postdoc at ISIS neutron spallation source and Stockholm University, he developed new tools to characterise batteries in-situ using neutron diffraction. Dr Jacas is currently a leading researcher for the battery section at the Catalonia Institute for Energy Research. His research aims to develop new electrode materials for next-generation batteries, including Co-free, Li-S and solid-state batteries. Since 2020, he has been the coordinator of the COBRA project (H2020-875568) devoted to fabricating generation 3b Li-ion batteries for electric vehicles.
The Nanotechnology Research Group at the Bernal Institute is led by Professor Kevin M. Ryan who holds a Personal Chair in Chemical Nanotechnology and is Course Director of the Pharmaceutical and Industrial Chemistry Degree at the Department of Chemical and Environmental Sciences (CES), University of Limerick. Previous affiliations included Marie Curie Fellowship positions at the University of California, Berkeley, USA and Merck Chemicals Southampton, UK following BSc and PhD degrees at University College Cork. The group research Interests are in Semiconductor Nanocrystals and Nanowires with emphasis on Synthesis, Assembly and Device Applications in Energy Storage and Energy Conversion Applications. The group also studies nucleation and growth in both hard (metal, semiconductor) and soft (pharmaceutical) nanocrystal materials with emphasis on size, shape and crystal phase control.
Solution-processable two-dimensional nanomaterials (nanosheets) are attracting increasing research efforts due to their extraordinary electronic, phononic, optical, and mechanical properties, which makes them promising materials for a myriad of applications (spintronic devices, field-effect transistors, nanoscale sensors, batteries, inexpensive photodetectors, LEDs, and lasers). 2D nanomaterials can be obtained by exfoliation of bulk crystals or grown on substrates by MBE or CVD. However, these methods are not suitable to produce large amounts of free-standing 2D nanosheets and lack control over their shape and lateral dimensions. Solution-based "bottom-up" colloidal chemical methods offer an appealing alternative and are emerging as promising routes for fundamental insights as well as for applications. This symposium intends to bring together the multidisciplinary scientific community working on this nascent field and will address not only the bottom-up solution synthesis of 2D nanomaterials, but also their chemistry, physics and applications in devices.
- Advanced solution-based bottom-up synthesis of 2D nanomaterials (colloidal methods, exfoliation, metal-organic approaches)
- Physical properties of solution-based 2D nanomaterials (spectroscopy, mechanical and electronic properties, electron and spin transport)
- Chemical properties of solution-based 2D nanomaterials (chemical stability, chemical selforganization, photocatalytic activity, interaction of organic and inorganic materials)
- Self-organization of 2D nanomaterials into superstructures
- Devices based on solution-processed 2D nanomaterials (transistors, photodetectors, solar cells, LEDs, lasers)
- Theory of 2D materials (DOS, optical properties, growth mechanisms)
Celso de Mello Donega is an Associate Professor in the Chemistry Department of the Faculty of Sciences at Utrecht University in the Netherlands. His expertise is in the field of synthesis and optical spectroscopy of luminescent materials. His research is focused on the chemistry and optoelectronic properties of nanomaterials, with particular emphasis on colloidal nanocrystals and heteronanocrystals.
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Christian Klinke studied physics at the University of Karlsruhe (Germany) where he also obtained his diploma degree in the group of Thomas Schimmel. In March 2000 he joined the group of Klaus Kern at the Institute of Experimental Physics of the EPFL (Lausanne, Switzerland). Then from 2003 on he worked as Post-Doc at the IBM TJ Watson Research Center (Yorktown Heights, USA) in the group of Phaedon Avouris. In 2006 then he became member of the Horst Weller group at the Universitiy of Hamburg (Germany). In 2007 he started as assistant professor at the University of Hamburg. In 2009 he received the German Nanotech Prize (Nanowissenschaftspreis, AGeNT-D/BMBF). His research was supported by an ERC Starting Grant and a Heisenberg fellowship of the German Funding Agency DFG. Since 2017 he is an associate professor at the Swansea University and since 2019 full professor at the University of Rostock.
David J. Norris received his B.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Chemistry from the University of Chicago (1990) and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1995), respectively. After an NSF postdoctoral fellowship with W. E. Moerner at the University of California, San Diego, he led a small independent research group at the NEC Research Institute in Princeton (1997). He then became an Associate Professor (2001–2006) and Professor (2006–2010) of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Minnesota, where he also served as Director of Graduate Studies in Chemical Engineering (2004–2010). In 2010, he moved to ETH Zurich where he is currently Professor of Materials Engineering. From 2016 to 2019 he served as the Head of the Department of Mechanical and Process Engineering. He has received the Credit Suisse Award for Best Teacher at ETH, twice the Golden Owl Award for Best Teacher in his department, the Max Rössler Research Prize, an ERC Advanced Grant, and the ACS Nano Lectureship Award. He is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, and an editorial board member for ACS Photonics and Nano Letters. His research focuses on how materials can be engineered to create new and useful optical properties.
Laurens Siebbeles (1963) is leader of the Opto-Electronic Materials Section and deputy head of the Dept. of Chemical Engineering at the Delft University of Technology in The Netherlands. His research involves studies of the motion of electrons in novel nanostructured materials that have potential applications in e.g. solar cells, light-emitting diodes and nanoelectronics. Materials of interest include organic nanostructured materials, semiconductor quantum dots, nanorods and two-dimensional materials. Studies on charge and exciton dynamics are carried out using ultrafast time-resolved laser techniques and high-energy electron pulses in combination with quantum theoretical modeling.
Vanmaekelbergh's research started in the field of semiconductor electrochemistry in the 1980s; this later evolved into the electrochemical fabrication of macroporous semiconductors as the strongest light scatterers for visible light, and the study of electron transport in disordered (particulate) semiconductors. In the last decade, Vanmaekelbergh's interest shifted to the field of nanoscience: the synthesis of colloidal semiconductor quantum dots and self-assembled quantum-dot solids, the study of their opto-electronic properties with optical spectroscopy and UHV cryogenic Scanning Tunneling Microscopy and Spectroscopy, and electron transport in electrochemically-gated quantum-dot solids. Scanning tunnelling spectroscopy is also used to study the electronic states in graphene quantum dots. More recently, the focus of the research has shifted to 2-D nano structured semiconductors, e.g. honeycomb semiconductors with Dirac-type electronic bands.
One of the challenges in developing halide perovskite optoelectronics into low cost and highly efficient commercial applications is their sustainability and environmental impact, especially with respect to the presence of lead (Pb) in the perovskite materials and to the use of toxic solvents in device fabrication. Various strategies were suggested to address this issue, from replacing toxic substances to methodologies for limiting their pollution. This symposium is aimed at bringing together researchers addressing this challenge from different angles and perspectives, towards fruitful collaborations.
- Environmental impact and LCA of halide perovskite materials and devices
- On-device Pb sequestration
- Recycling and recovery of halide perovskite materials and devices
- Pb-free halide perovskites
- Green manufacture of halide perovskite devices
Filippo De Angelis is senior research scientist and a deputy director at the CNR Institute of Molecular Sciences and Technology, in Perugia, Italy. He is the founder and leader of the Computational Laboratory for Hybrid/Organic Photovoltaics. He earned a BS in Chemistry in 1996 and a PhD in Theoretical Inorganic Chemistry in 1999, both from the University of Perugia. He is an expert in the development and application of quantum mechanical methods to the study of hybrid/organic photovoltaics and materials for energy applications. He is Fellow of the European Academy of Sciences. He has published >270 papers with > 17000 citations.
Giulia is Associate Professor at Physical Chemistry Unit at University of Pavia, leading the PVsquared2 team, and running the European Grant ERCStG Project “HYNANO”aiming at the development of advanced hybrid perovskites materials and innovative functional interfaces for efficient, cheap and stable photovoltaics. Within this field, Giulia contributed to reveal the fundamental lightinduced dynamical processes underlying the operation of such advanced optoelectronic devices whose understanding is paramount for a smart device development and for contributing to the transition of a green economy.
Giulia received an MS in Physical Engineering in 2008 and obtained her PhD in Physics cum laude in 2012 at the Politecnico of Milan. Her experimental thesis focused on the realisation of a new femtosecond-microscope for mapping the ultrafast phenomena at organic interfaces. During her PhD, she worked for one year at the Physics Department of Oxford University where she pioneered new concepts within polymer/oxide solar cell technology. From 2012-2015, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology in Milan. In 2015, she joined the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) with a Co-Funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship. From 2016 to 2019, she has been awarded by the Swiss Ambizione Energy Grant providing a platform to lead her independent research group at EPFL focused on the developemnt of new generation hybrid perovskite solar cells.
She is author of 90 peer-reviewed scientific papers bringing her h-index to 44 (>13’000 citations), focused on developement and understanding of the interface physics which governs the operation of new generation solar cells.
Recently, she received the USERN prize in Physical Science, the Swiss Physical Society Award in 2018 for Young Researcher and the IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Optics. She is currently USERN Ambassador for Italy and board member of the Young Academy of Europe.
More can be found at https://pvsquared2.unipv.it.
Weblink: https://people.epfl.ch/giulia.grancini?lang=en
The author was graduated from Osaka University in 1978 and received Ph.D from Osaka University in 1983. He joined R&D Center in Toshiba from 1978 to 2000, during which the author was engaged in development of ULSI lithography, solar cells direct methanol fuel cells, and polysilane. He joined polysilane research in Robert West group of Wisconsin University (US) from 1988 to 1990. He was a professor of Kyushu Institute of Technology (National Institute) since 2001. From 2019, the author is a professor in The University of Electro-Communications in Japan. His research interest is printable solar cells.




Since 2019, Yana Vaynzof holds the Chair for Emerging Electronic Technologies at the Technical University of Dresden. Prior to that (2014-2019), she was a juniorprofessor in the Department of Physics and Astronomy, Heidelberg University (Germany). She received a B.Sc degree (summa cum laude) in electrical engineering from the Technion - Israel Institute of Technology (Israel) in 2006, and a M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from Princeton University, (USA) in 2008. She pursued a Ph.D. degree in physics under the supervision of Prof. Sir. Richard Friend at the Optoelectronics Group, Cavendish Laboratory, University of Cambridge (UK), and investigated the development of hybrid polymer solar cells and the improvement of their efficiency and stability. Upon completing her PhD in 2011, she joined the Microelectronics group at the University of Cambridge as a Postdoctoral Research Associate focusing on the research of surfaces and interfaces in organic and hybrid optoelectronics. Yana Vaynzof was the recipient of a number of fellowships and awards, including the ERC Starting Grant, Gordon Y. Wu Fellowship, Henry Kressel Fellowship, Fulbright-Cottrell Award and the Walter Kalkhof-Rose Memorial Prize.



Senol Öz obtained his diploma in chemistry in 2013 at the University of Cologne
(Germany). Completing his PhD under supervision of Prof. Sanjay Mathur in 2018 at
University of Cologne (Merck KGaA PhD scholarship). In 2019 he joined Prof.
Tsutomu Miyasaka`s group as a post-doctoral fellow at Toin University of Yokohama
under a JSPS scholarship. His research interests include the synthesis, chemical
engineering, and solution processing of inorganic-organic hybrid metal halide
perovskite materials for photovoltaic application. He is currently a senior R&D project
leader at Saule Technologies and managing director of Solaveni GmbH.
Electrochemistry plays a focal role in the development of better and more efficient catalytic processes for the use of electricity to form or break chemical bonds. This discipline is closely associated with the development of new renewable energy solutions, such as energy storage (electrolysers, ammonia and other renewable fuels) and chemical production (from CO2 or biomass). In particular, electrocatalysis has allowed in recent years to achieve significant development on material development and reaction optimization for processes aiming at the synthesis of value-added chemicals and renewable fuels. With this symposium, we want to highlight the scientific excellence in this field. We will bring together the researchers that are currently leading topics such as CO2 electrochemical conversion, electrochemical ammonia synthesis, electrochemical activation and conversion of methane, and electrosynthesis of high-value chemicals. We aim at a symposium with several renowned keynote speakers, excellent invited speakers followed by a session of contributed talks, with ample time for questions and discussions. We will strongly encourage abstract submission for contributed talks and Posters, which will allow for a wide variety of researchers to share their exciting work. We will ensure the diversity of our speakers.
- Materials and electrochemistry of carbon dioxide reduction
- Electrocatalytic synthesis of high-value compounds: new routes and materials
- lectrochemistry for the valorization of biomass
- Materials and electrochemistry of N-containing compounds
- Materials and electrochemistry of methane activation and conversion
Corina Andronescu received her B.Sc. and M.Sc. from the University Politehnica of Bucharest (Romania) in 2009 and 2011, respectively. Her Ph.D. title she received from the same university in 2014. In 2016 she joined the group of Prof. W. Schuhmann (Ruhr University Bochum, Germany) first as postdoctoral researcher and later as group leader. December 2018, she was appointed Junior Professor at the University of Duisburg-Essen, where she is currently leading the group of Electrochemical Catalysis in the Faculty of Chemistry. Her research interests include development of hybrid electrocatalysts for the CO2 electroreduction reaction, alcohol electrooxidation as well as investigation of electrocatalysts at nanoscale using Scanning Electrochemical Cell Microscopy.
Marta Hatzell is an Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Georgia Institute of Technology. Prior to starting at Georgia Tech in August of 2015, she was a Post-Doctoral researcher in the Department of Material Science and Engineering at the University of Illinois - Urbana-Campaign. During her post doc, she worked in the Braun Research group on research at the interface between colloid science and electrochemistry. She completed her PhD at Penn state University in the Logan Research Group. Her PhD explored environmental technology for energy generation and water treatment. During graduate school she was an NSF and PEO Graduate Research Fellow.
Currently her research group focuses on exploring the role photochemistry and electrochemistry may play in future sustainable systems. She is an active member of the American Chemical Society, the Electrochemical Society, ASEEP, AICHE, and ASME. Dr. Hatzell has also been awarded the NSF Early CAREER award in 2019, the Alfred P. Sloan Fellowship in Chemistry in 2020, the ONR Young Investigator Award in 2020, the ECS Toyota Young Investigator award in 2021, and the Moore Inventor Fellow in 2021.


Marc T.M. Koper is Professor of Surface Chemistry and Catalysis at Leiden University, The Netherlands. He received his PhD degree (1994) from Utrecht University (The Netherlands) in the field of electrochemistry. He was an EU Marie Curie postdoctoral fellow at the University of Ulm (Germany) and a Fellow of Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (KNAW) at Eindhoven University of Technology, before moving to Leiden University in 2005. His main research interests are in fundamental aspects of electrocatalysis, proton-coupled electron transfer, theoretical electrochemistry, and electrochemical surface science.
I am currently an Full Professor at the University of Bonn (Germany), Department of Chemistry. My overarching motivation is to discover and implement the chemistry necessary to transition to a sustainable energy-based society. Specifically, I am developing materials to convert electrical energy to fuels and chemicals.
Ifan is Senior Lecturer at Imperial College London. Prior to Ifan's appointment at Imperial in 2017, he was Asssociate Professor and Leader of the Electrocatalysis Group at the Technical University of Denmark (DTU).In 2015, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) appointed Ifan as the Peabody Visiting Associate Professor.
Ifan leverages the insight from fundamental electrochemistry experiments to discover new catalyst materials with unprecedented performance. Ifan’s research ultimately aims to enable the large-scale electrochemical conversion of renewable energy to fuels and valuable chemicals and vice versa. He has 62 peer reviewed publications, 2 patents, 4 patent applicaitons and is cofounder of the spinout company, HPNow.
Materials able to regenerate after damage have been the object of investigation since the ancient times. For instance, self-healing concretes, able to resist earthquakes, aging, weather, and seawater have been known since the times of ancient Rome and are still the object of research. During the last decade, there has been an increasing interest in self-healing electronic materials, for applications in electronic skin (E-skin) for health monitoring, wearable and stretchable sensors, actuators, transistors, energy harvesting, and storage devices. Self-healing materials based on conducting polymers are particularly attractive due to their tunable high conductivity, good stability, intrinsic flexibility, excellent processability and biocompatibility. Here we review recent developments in the field of self‐healing electronic materials based on conducting polymers, such as poly 3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene (PEDOT), polypyrrole (PPy), polyaniline (PANI). This symposum will deal with differnt types of self healing materials, the strategies adopted to optimize electrical and mechanical properties and the various possible healing mechanisms.
- Self healing
- Electronic devices
- Organic electronics
Electrocatalysis is a critical field that drives many important technological applications, including energy conversion, environmental remediation, and chemical synthesis. However, despite its widespread use, there are still significant gaps in our understanding of electrocatalytic processes at the nanoscale. In situ/operando microscopy and spectroscopy techniques, which allow for the observation of these processes in real time over several lengthscales, are crucial for bridging this gap. This symposium aims to discuss progress and challenges in the use of in-situ and operando methods to characterize electrified interfaces. Among other techniques, the symposium will provide an overview of the state-of-the-art in in-situ electrochemical scanning microscopy, operando electron microscopy, as well as in situ optical and vibrational spectroscopy to evaluate dynamic active sites and reaction pathways. The symposium will bring together leading researchers from academia and industry, providing a platform for the exchange of ideas and the exploration of new approaches and collaborations. Participants will have the opportunity to engage in lively discussions on topics ranging from fundamental mechanisms of electrocatalysis to the design and optimization of next-generation electrochemical devices.
- In situ/operando electron and scanning probe microscopy
- In situ vibrational and optical spectroscopy.
- Electrocatalytic energy conversion
Jesús Barrio Hermida received his Bachelor of Science in Chemistry from the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Madrid, Spain) in 2014, where he got in touch for the first time with chemical research whilst working in the synthesis and characterization of Fe and Cu coordination polymers in the Inorganic Chemistry department.
In 2016, he obtained his Master in Nanoscience and Molecular Nanotechnology from the same institution. His Master Thesis, carried out at the IMDEA Nanoscience Institute entailed the formation of controlled assemblies of plasmonic building blocks and was directed by Dr. Beatriz H. Juárez and Prof. Félix Zamora.
Due to a scholarship in the Erasmus program, he moved to the Max Planck Institute for Colloids and Interfaces (Potsdam, Germany) for pursuing his doctoral studies, and in September 2016, he joined the Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (Beer-Sheva, Israel) along with his PhD supervisor, Prof. Menny Shalom, where he obtained his PhD in May 2020. His doctoral thesis focused on the design of metal-free carbon nitride materials for photo-electrocatalytic applications.
In June 2020 he joined the Materials Department at Imperial College as a Research Associate for working along with Dr. Ifan Stephens and Prof. Magda Titirici in the design of hybrid metal-carbon composites for different electrochemical applications. In August 2023 he started his independent career as an Imperial College Research Fellow at the Chemical Engineering Deaprtment of Imperial. His research covers the synthesis of carbon-based materials for different energy-related scenarios.
Doing my BSc/MSc in Physics and PhD in an interdisciplinary program crossing the disciplines like Chemical Engineering, Nanotechnology, and Electrochemistry made me who I am today – a scientist who enjoys the challenge of multifaceted research.
I enjoy doing basic research in order to solve applied tasks. This explains my research interest in fundamental physical chemistry, e.g. oxidation and dissolution of metals and semiconductors, electrocatalysis, and electrochemistry at modified interfaces but also electrochemical engineering, e.g. development and optimization of catalyst layers in fuel cells and water electrolyzes.
Progress in basic research is often a direct outcome of previous achievements in experimental instrumentation. Hence, a significant part of my interest is in the development of new tools, e.g. electrochemical on-line mass spectrometry, gas diffusion electrode approaches, and high-throughput screening methods.
Magalí Lingenfelder is currently leading the Max Planck-EPFL Laboratory for Molecular Nanoscience in Lausanne, Switzerland. Her vision is to create atomically tailored interfaces for applications in two distinct areas of urgent technological and societal relevance: energy conversion and antimicrobial interfaces.
She studied physical and biological chemistry at the National University of Córdoba in Argentina. In 2003 she finished her MSc thesis at the Max Planck Institute for the Solid State Research (MPI-FKF in Stuttgart, Germany) with seminal contributions to the field of metal-organic coordination networks on solid surfaces. She continued with her doctoral studies in Physics, and received the Otto Hahn medal of the Max Planck Society in 2008 for the microscopic understanding of the chiral recognition process with submolecular resolution. In her quest to study molecular recognition going from 2D to 3D complex systems, she made postdoctoral stays at the Institute of Materials Sciences in Barcelona, and at the Molecular Foundry of the Lawrence Berkeley National Lab in the US.
She is a committed mentor, and since her relocation from Berkeley to EPFL in 2013, she directed 3 MSc theses, 4 PhD theses, and 4 postdocs. She advocates for problem-oriented interdisciplinary research: she is pioneering the emerging field of BioNanoarchitectonics, she led 5 international research consortiums, delivered over 40 invited presentations, and organized 9 conferences and 4 doctoral schools. In 2018, the Royal Society of Chemistry included her work in the first collection “Celebrating Excellence in Research: 100 Women of Chemistry”.
Prof. Beatriz Roldán Cuenya is currently Director of the Interface Science Department at the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society in Berlin (Germany). She is an Honorary Professor at the Technische Universität Berlin, at the Freie Universität Berlin, and at the Ruhr-University Bochum, all in Germany. Also, she serves as a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Central Florida (USA).
Prof. Roldán Cuenya began her academic career by completing her M.S./B.S. in Physics with a minor in Materials Science at the University of Oviedo, Spain in 1998. Afterwards she moved to Germany and obtained her Ph.D. from the Department of Physics of the University of Duisburg-Essen with summa cum laude in 2001. Subsequently, she carried out her postdoctoral research in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of California Santa Barbara (USA) until 2003.
In 2004, she joined the Department of Physics at the University of Central Florida (UCF) as Assistant Professor where she moved through the ranks to become a full professor in 2012. In 2013 Prof. Roldan Cuenya, moved to Germany to become Chair Professor of Solid State Physics in the Department of Physics at Ruhr-University Bochum until 2017.
During her academic career, Prof. Roldan Cuenya received an Early CAREER Award from the US National Science Foundation (2005) and the international Peter Mark Memorial award from the American Vacuum Society (2009). In 2016 she became Fellow of the Max Planck Society in Germany and also received the prestigious Consolidator Award from the European Research Council. In 2020, she became a member of the Academia Europaea (Academy of Europe). She received the AVS Fellow Award (2021), the International Society of Electrochemistry-Elsevier Prize for Experimental Electrochemistry (2021), the 2022 Paul H. Emmet Award of the North American Catalysis Society, and the Röntgen Medal of the City of Remscheid (2022).
Prof. Roldan Cuenya is the author of more than 200 peer-reviewed publications, 6 book chapters, and 6 patents. She has given 245 invited talks, with 13 plenary talks and 33 keynote lectures since 2017. Her H-factor is 74 (Google Scholar) and her work has received over 21,500 citations.
She presently serves on the editorial advisory boards of the Journal of Catalysis and Chemical Reviews. In addition, she also contributes to a number of advisory committees, including the Liquid Sunlight Alliance (USA), the Advanced Research Center Chemical Building Blocks Consortium (Utrecht, the Netherlands), the Spanish Synchrotron Facility ALBA (Barcelona, Spain), the German Synchrotron DESY (Hamburg, Germany), the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin for the strategic development of BESSY II (Berlin, Germany), the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ in Tarragona, Spain), the UK Catalysis Hub and the Ertl Center for Electrochemistry & Catalysis (South Korea).
Prof. Roldan Cuenya’s research program explores physical and chemical properties of nanostructures, with emphasis on advancements in nanocatalysis based on operando microscopic and spectroscopic characterization.
Recent advances in device manufacturing and reactor engineering have led to the successful demonstration of solar fuel production on a square-meter scale. Such systems can operate beyond several weeks under outdoor conditions (i.e., natural variations in light intensity and temperature fluctuations), showcasing the potential of photo(electro)chemistry towards real-world implementation. This symposium will provide an overview of the latest progress in scalable solar fuel technologies towards H2 evolution, water oxidation and CO2 reduction. To this end, we invite submissions on practical aspects of photo(electro)catalysis including scalable fabrication methods, stability and corrosion, modularity, rational device and reactor design, robust materials (e.g., oxide and carbon-based light absorbers), commercial applicability, or life-cycle considerations. In addition, we look forward to contributions on innovative approaches to practical solar light harvesting, including high-throughput fabrication or concentrated light systems. This symposium aims to bring together a wide range of complementary expertise in light harvesting, catalysis and chemical engineering, which will bring artificial photosynthesis systems closer to real-world applications.
- Photoelectrode scalability and modularity
- Material design towards long-term operation
- Device engineering and reactor design (experiment and modelling)
- Real-world benchmarking: light intermittency and temperature fluctuations
- Photo(electro)catalyst screening and large-scale fabrication
Fatwa Abdi is an Associate Professor at the School of Energy and Environment, City University of Hong Kong. Until July 2023, he was a group leader and the deputy head of the Institute for Solar Fuels, Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin (HZB). He obtained his PhD (cum laude) in Chemical Engineering from TU Delft, the Netherlands, in 2013. He was the recipient of the Martinus van Marum prize from the Royal Dutch Society of Sciences and Humanities. His research focusses on the development of novel (photo)electrode materials as well as engineering and scale-up of devices for solar fuels and chemicals conversion.
Virgil Andrei obtained his Bachelor and Master of Science degrees in chemistry from Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, where he studied thermoelectric polymer pastes and films in the group of Prof. Klaus Rademann (2014-2016). He then pursued a PhD in chemistry at the University of Cambridge (2016-2020), where he developed perovskite-based artificial leaves in the group of Prof. Erwin Reisner, working closely with the Optoelectronics group of Prof. Richard Friend at the Cavendish Laboratory. He was recently a visiting Winton fellow in the group of Prof. Peidong Yang at University of California, Berkeley, and is currently a Title A Research Fellow at St John's College, Cambridge. His work places a strong focus on scalability, material design, complementary light harvesting and synthesis of added-value carbon products, introducing modern fabrication techniques towards low-cost, high-throughput solar fuel production.
Vincent Artero was born in 1973. He is a graduate of the Ecole Normale Supérieure (Ulm; D/S 93) and of the University Pierre et Marie Curie (Paris 6). He received the Ph.D. degree in 2000 under the supervision of Prof. A. Proust. His doctoral work dealt with organometallic derivatives of polyoxometalates. After a postdoctoral stay at the University of Aachen (Aix la Chapelle) with Prof. U. Kölle, he joined in 2001 the group of Prof. M. Fontecave in Grenoble with a junior scientist position in the Life Science Division of CEA. Since 2016, he is Research Director at CEA and leads the SolHyCat group. His current research interests are in bio-inspired chemistry including catalysis related to hydrogen energy and artificial photosynthesis.
Vincent Artero received the "Grand Prix Mergier-Bourdeix de l'Académie des Sciences" in 2011 and has been granted with a Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council (ERC, photocatH2ode project 2012-2017). He's a member of the Young academy of Europe (YAE). He currently acts as Chair of the Scientific Advisory Board of the ARCANE Excellence Laboratory Network (LABEX) for bio-driven chemistry in Grenoble and as co-head of the French network (CNRS-Groupement de recherche) on Solar Fuels. Since 2016, Vincent Artero is associate editor of the Royal Society of Chemistry journal "Sustainable Energy and Fuels". From January 2018 onward, he actsas associate editor of the Royal Society of Chemistry flagship journal "Chemical Science"
Sophia Haussener is a Professor heading the Laboratory of Renewable Energy Science and Engineering at the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne (EPFL). Her current research is focused on providing design guidelines for thermal, thermochemical, and photoelectrochemical energy conversion reactors through multi-physics modelling and experimentation. Her research interests include: thermal sciences, fluid dynamics, charge transfer, electro-magnetism, and thermo/electro/photochemistry in complex multi-phase media on multiple scales. She received her MSc (2007) and PhD (2010) in Mechanical Engineering from ETH Zurich. She was a postdoctoral researcher at the Joint Center of Artificial Photosynthesis (JCAP) and the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL) between 2011 and 2012. She has published over 70 articles in peer-reviewed journals and conference proceedings, and 2 books. She has been awarded the ETH medal (2011), the Dimitris N. Chorafas Foundation award (2011), the ABB Forschungspreis (2012), the Prix Zonta (2015), the Global Change Award (2017), and the Raymond Viskanta Award (2019), and is a recipient of a Starting Grant of the Swiss National Science Foundation (2014).


Roel van de Krol is head of the Insitute for Solar Fuels at the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin fuer Materialien und Energie (HZB), and professor at the Chemistry Department of TU Berlin. After earning his PhD from TU Delft in 2000 and a postdoctoral stay at M.I.T. (USA), he returned to TU Delft where he was an assistant professor until 2012. At HZB, his research focuses on the development of materials and devices for the photoelectrochemical conversion of sunlight to chemical fuels. Understanding how surface and bulk defects in thin films and nanomaterials affect light absorption, charge transport, recombination and catalytic activity is at the heart of these efforts.
This symposium concentrates on metal halide perovskite from fundamental topics and their influence on device fabrication as well as recent advances in the field of perovskites for optoelectronic applications. This can range from solar cells, light-emitting diodes or detectors.
Currently, the rapid performance increases for solar cell efficiencies to a now certified 25.8% have not been equally matched with a more fundamental understanding. Ideally, to improve further and to also understand on a deeper level why perovskite materials show such astonishing performances, the underlying theory for perovskites needs to advance further. Thus, the aim is to bring together researchers, who investigate fundamental aspects of hybrid perovskites with researchers, who focus mainly on device fabrication and performance.
- Photo-physical properties of halide perovskites
- Optical properties of perovskite single nanoparticles, and single photon emission
- Quantum confinement and heterostructures related to halide perovskite
- Solar cell fabrication- additives, non-toxic components, green solvents
- Stability of halide perovskite from fundamental to devices
Lioz Etgar obtained his Ph.D. (2009) at the Technion–Israel Institute of Technology and completed post-doctoral research with Prof. Michael Grätzel at EPFL, Switzerland. In his post-doctoral research, he received a Marie Curie Fellowship and won the Wolf Prize for young scientists. Since 2012, he has been a senior lecturer in the Institute of Chemistry at the Hebrew University. On 2017 he received an Associate Professor position. Prof. Etgar was the first to demonstrate the possibility to work with the perovskite as light harvester and hole conductor in the solar cell which result in one of the pioneer publication in this field. Recently Prof. Etgar won the prestigious Krill prize by the Wolf foundation. Etgar’s research group focuses on the development of innovative solar cells. Prof. Etgar is researching new excitonic solar cells structures/architectures while designing and controlling the inorganic light harvester structure and properties to improve the photovoltaic parameters.
Giulia is Associate Professor at Physical Chemistry Unit at University of Pavia, leading the PVsquared2 team, and running the European Grant ERCStG Project “HYNANO”aiming at the development of advanced hybrid perovskites materials and innovative functional interfaces for efficient, cheap and stable photovoltaics. Within this field, Giulia contributed to reveal the fundamental lightinduced dynamical processes underlying the operation of such advanced optoelectronic devices whose understanding is paramount for a smart device development and for contributing to the transition of a green economy.
Giulia received an MS in Physical Engineering in 2008 and obtained her PhD in Physics cum laude in 2012 at the Politecnico of Milan. Her experimental thesis focused on the realisation of a new femtosecond-microscope for mapping the ultrafast phenomena at organic interfaces. During her PhD, she worked for one year at the Physics Department of Oxford University where she pioneered new concepts within polymer/oxide solar cell technology. From 2012-2015, she was a post-doctoral researcher at the Italian Institute of Technology in Milan. In 2015, she joined the Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) with a Co-Funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie Fellowship. From 2016 to 2019, she has been awarded by the Swiss Ambizione Energy Grant providing a platform to lead her independent research group at EPFL focused on the developemnt of new generation hybrid perovskite solar cells.
She is author of 90 peer-reviewed scientific papers bringing her h-index to 44 (>13’000 citations), focused on developement and understanding of the interface physics which governs the operation of new generation solar cells.
Recently, she received the USERN prize in Physical Science, the Swiss Physical Society Award in 2018 for Young Researcher and the IUPAP Young Scientist Prize in Optics. She is currently USERN Ambassador for Italy and board member of the Young Academy of Europe.
More can be found at https://pvsquared2.unipv.it.
Weblink: https://people.epfl.ch/giulia.grancini?lang=en
Iván Mora-Seró (1974, M. Sc. Physics 1997, Ph. D. Physics 2004) is researcher at Universitat Jaume I de Castelló (Spain). His research during the Ph.D. at Universitat de València (Spain) was centered in the crystal growth of semiconductors II-VI with narrow gap. On February 2002 he joined the University Jaume I. From this date until nowadays his research work has been developed in: electronic transport in nanostructured devices, photovoltaics, photocatalysis, making both experimental and theoretical work. Currently he is associate professor at University Jaume I and he is Principal Researcher (Research Division F4) of the Institute of Advanced Materials (INAM). Recent research activity was focused on new concepts for photovoltaic conversion and light emission based on nanoscaled devices and semiconductor materials following two mean lines: quantum dot solar cells with especial attention to sensitized devices and lead halide perovskite solar cells and LEDs, been this last line probably the current hottest topic in the development of new solar cells.
Pablo P. Boix received his PhD. in Nanoscience and Nanotechnology from the Universitat Jaume I (2012, Castelló, Spain), with the focus on unveiling the physical processes governing optoelectronic devices such as dye sensitized, quantum dots and organic solar cells; as well as solar fuel systems. In 2012, he joined the Energy Research Institute (at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore), where he led a research line on hybrid lead halide perovskites for photovoltaic and light emission applications. As industrial R&D experience, in 2016, he worked on perovskite solar cells development (Dyesol Ltd., Lausanne, Switzerland). After that, Pablo joined ICMol (Universitat de València) as a Ramon y Cajal fellow. His research has contributed to the implementation of new materials and device concepts. As a result, his scientific production includes more than 70 articles in peer-reviewed scientific journals, with h-index: 39 (Web of Science) and 2 patents among others.
Nanoengineered donor-acceptor organic semiconductor materials and film morphologies for printable photovoltaics have formed a significant focus area for this sub-category of future clean energy technologies. The power conversion efficiency (PCE) record of bulk heterojunction organic photovoltaics (OPV) reached 19% in 2021, and alongside this achievement eco-friendly processed nanoparticle OPV has made a surprising leap to the 10% efficiency threshold. New interest in engineering nanoparticles for photocatalytic hydrogen evolution has facilitated parallel advancements in the same materials for photovoltaics. This symposium will focus on recent advances in nanoengineered materials and morphologies for printable photovoltaics, with a particular focus on non-fullerene acceptors and green sustainable processing. Nanoengineering strategies are only as good as the microscopy techniques that can confirm them, and hence a second arm of this symposium will include the associated advanced characterisation tools used by the research field.
- Synchrotron NEXAFS, STXM, laminography and RSoXS studies
- Non-synchrotron techniques of STEM-EDX, EELS and electron diffraction
Dr Natalie Holmes leads a research team at the University of Sydney Faculty of Engineering developing nanostructured materials for organic electronics and biomedical devices. Materials engineering for these fields has been the focus of her research over the past decade, and takes her each year to international synchrotron facilities to measure the precise nanostructure of these cutting-edge functional materials. Natalie holds a PhD in Chemistry from the University of Newcastle (2016), and is an Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) scholar. She has led research projects in nanostructuring materials for eco-friendly coated solar cells at Karlstad University (Sweden) and nanostructured thin-film devices for electronic biosensors and solar cells at the University of Newcastle.
Dr. Habil. Martin Brinkmann (07.10.1971 in Mulhouse, France)
Directeur de Recherche CNRS
Institut Charles Sadron
CNRS Université de Strasbourg
23 rue du loess
67034 Strasbourg – France
h=45, 137 publications
Scientific Career
Since 2013 Director of Research CNRS
2002. Invited Researcher EPFL, group of L. Zuppiroli
2000 -2013 Senior Scientist CNRS
1999-2000 Postdoctoral researcher MIT, Cambridge, USA
1997-1999 Postdoctoral researcher at CNR Bologna, Italy
1994-1997 PhD, University Louis Pasteur, Strasbourg
Scientific Focus
Structure and morphology in thin organic films,
Organic semiconductors,
Transmission Electron Microscopy,
Crystallization and orientation of polymer and molecular materials,
Growth control in organic thin films. Polymer Thermoelectric Materials.
Scientific Awards
2007 CNRS Bronze Medal
2011 Prize of Groupe Français des Polymères – Société Française de Physique
Management activities
2013-2020 SYCOMMOR Group leader, ICS
2018-now Deputy-director of Doctoral School of Physics and Chemical Physics
ED182, Strasbourg
2017-now. IC FRC and GFP member
2018-now: Coordinator ANR ANISOTHERM
Supervision:
12 PhD students (Bruno Schmaltz, Christelle Vergnat, Navaphun Kayunkid, Lucia Hartmann, Alexandru Sarbu, Amer Hamidi-Sakr, Morgane Diebold, Vishnu Vijajakumar, Marion Brosset, Yuhan Zong, Shubhradip Guchait),
7 postdocs (Jean-François Moulin, Sirapat Pratontep, Navaphun Kayunkid, Uttiya Sureeporn, Nicolas Crespo-Monteiro, Maria Girleanu, Laure Biniek)
Teaching “Structure and Growth of Conjugated Polymer and Molecular Materials” , Master polymer Science (2010-2012), Strasbourg.
Reviewing: Macromolecules, Chemistry of Materials, JACS, Advanced Functional Materials, Advanced Materials, J. Mater. Chem. C
Project reviewer for ANR, DFG, NSF, Swiss national Science foundation
Five most important publications
1) M. Brinkmann, J.-C. Wittmann: Orientation of regio-regular poly(3-hexylthiophene) by directional solidification: a simple method to reveal the semi-crystalline structure of a conjugated polymer, Adv. Mat. 2006, 18, 860.
2) N. Kayunkid, S. Uttiya and M. Brinkmann: Structural model of regioregular poly(3-hexylthiophene) obtained by electron diffraction analysis, Macromolecules 2010, 43, 4961.
3) M. Brinkmann, E. Gonthier, S. Bogen, K. Tremmel, S. Ludwigs, M. Hufnagel, M. Sommer: Segregated versus mixed stacking of bithiophene and naphthalene bisimide units in highly oriented films of an n-type polymeric semiconductor, ACS Nano, 2012, 6, 10319.
4) A. Hamidi Sakr, L. Biniek, S. Fall, M. Brinkmann: Precise control of crystal size in highly oriented regioregular poly(3-hexylthiophene) thin films prepared by high temperature rubbing: correlations with optical properties and charge transport, Adv. Funct. Mat. 2016, 26, 408.
5) Vijayakumar, V.; Zhong, Y.; Untilova, V.; Bahri, M.; Herrmann, L.; Biniek, L.; Leclerc, N.; Brinkmann, M. Bringing Conducting Polymers to High Order: Toward Conductivities beyond 105 S cm−1 and Thermoelectric Power Factors of 2 mW m−1 K−2. Advanced Energy Materials 2019, 9, 1900266.
Xun (Caroline) Pan received her PhD degree in Chemistry from Flinders University in 2018. Since then, she is working as a postdoctoral research associate under the supervision of Prof. Mats Andersson. Her research focuses on the semiconducting materials and nanoparticles applied in organic solar cells. With a passion in understanding the fundamental properties of semiconducting materials and correlating these properties with their photovoltaic performances, Dr. Xun (Caroline) Pan developed strong expertise in organic synthesis, fabrication of organic photovoltaics and different characterisation techniques, such as Dynamic Mechanical Thermal Analysis (DMTA), Differential Scanning Calorimetry (DSC), Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) and Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM).
Publications:
https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=5PT5HTgAAAAJ&hl=en


Dr. Cheng Wang is a Physicist Staff Scientist at the ALS, LBNL. He obtained his bachelor’s degree in physics from Jilin University, China in 2002, and received his Ph.D. in physics in North Carolina State University advised by Prof. Harald Ade in 2008. After graduation, he joined the ALS, LBNL where he led the development of Resonant Soft X-ray Scattering for soft materials and led the construction of the world’s first RSoXS beamline at ALS beamline 11.0.1.2. He is a leading expert on the development of soft X-ray metrology and utilize advanced synchrotron x-ray probes such as X-ray scattering, microscopy and spectroscopy to elucidate the morphology, chemistry, and interfacial structure of broad range of complex materials.
Guillaume Wantz graduated from the School of Chemistry and Physics of Bordeaux (ENSCPB) in 2001 including a thesis work at Philips Research (Eindhoven, NL) on ink-jet printing. He received his Ph.D. in Electronics Engineering from the University of Bordeaux in 2004 working on Polymer Light Emitting Diodes. He was Assistant Professor at the University of Bordeaux working on Organic Field Effect Transistors with research stays at Queen’s University (Kingston, Canada). In 2006, he was appointed as tenure Associate Professor at the Bordeaux Institute of Technology (Bordeaux INP). He is Professeur des Universités since 2021. His research interest is on Organic Electronics with a focus on polymer photovoltaic solar cells (OPV). He was invited-professor at Queen’s University (Kingston, Ontario, Canada) in Spring 2012 and at Univ. of Massachusetts (Amherst, USA) in Fall 2014. He has been appointed at the “Institut Universitaire de France” (IUF Paris) in 2016. Since 2017, he is Associate Editor for the journal “Materials Chemistry Frontiers” (RSC). He is co-founder of Héole, a company developing flexible OPV products including solar-powered sails for yachting, a solar zeppelin and some BIPV flexible OPV products. To date, he has published 125 research papers in peer-reviewed international journals and issued 7 patents (h = 37 – 6000 citations – source Google Scholar).
Benjamin Watts is a beamline scientist at the PolLux scanning transmission soft X-ray spectro-microscope (STXM) specialising in the materials analysis of soft matter. He obtained a BSc (Professional) in Physics, with Honours, and a PhD in Physics from the University of Newcastle, Australia, before working as a post-doctoral researcher with North Carolina State University (permanently stationed at the Advanced Light Source, Berkeley) in the USA and then moving to PSI. Details of the interactions between soft X-ray light and organic materials has been a continuing theme throughout both his university research and later career.
Perovskite solar cells (PSCs) have the potential to play a key role as future photovoltaics in the renewable generation of electricity from sunlight. For this vision to become true, currently prevailing limitations regarding the stability and scalability of PSCs need to be overcome to render the technology commercially viable. Since the power conversion efficiency (PCE) of single junction devices on a small area (∼0.1 cm2) reaches close to Shockley–Queisser limit, there is now a focus on the development of larger area perovskite solar modules. Scaling up the technology requires materials and processes that provide high homogeneity over a large area, batch-to-batch reproducibility, production yield, and low cost, which can ultimately enable a process transfer from laboratories to commercial fabrication lines. In this symposium, we will discuss various aspects of the industrialization of perovskite PV.
- Materials (composition, perovskite inks, additives, interlayers) and processes for large area deposition
- New module design and interconnection strategies
- Module characterization with advanced techniques
- Stability testing (accelerated indoor and outdoor) and failure analysis
- Circularity: life cycle analysis and recycling of perovskite PV
Dr Tom Aernouts is R&D leader of the Thin Film Photovoltaics group at imec. Over the last few years this activity has grown steadily with state-of-the-art work in organic solar cells and recently also perovskite-based photovoltaics, next to inorganic materials like Kesterites for future replacement of the currently strongly growing CIGS thin film solar cells. Also the lab environment was drastically improved with setting-up the O-line infrastructure in 2009 at imec, allowing the processing and characterization of thin film solar cells and modules with area up to 15 x 15 cm². A next upgrade in 2018 enabled to extend the device size to 35x35cm². Dr Aernouts earned his Master of Science and PhD degree in Physics (in 2006) at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium. Firstly, he worked on organic oligomer-based diode structures, afterwards continuing his research on organic photovoltaics at imec. There, his work focused on the processing and characterization of polymer-based organic solar cells and monolithic modules, introducing techniques like screen and inkjet printing. He has authored or co-authored more than 80 journal publications, book chapters and conference contributions. Also, his research group participates on a regular basis in a broad range of local and international projects, with the most recent example the coordination of the European H2020 project ESPResSo.
Dr. Hadjipanayi is a research scientist at the Photovoltaic Technology group in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering of the University of Cyprus working on the investigation of the optoelectronic characteristics and photovoltaic performance of novel solar cell devices and her latest work focuses on the characterization of perovskite-based PV and measurement protocol development.
She has received her BSc in Physics (2001) from the University of Cyprus and her DPhil (PhD) in Condensed Matter Physics (2006) from the University of Oxford. Her employment record includes a Post-Doctoral Research Associate position at the Quantum Information Processing Interdisciplinary Research Collaboration (QIP IRC), Department of Physics, University of Oxford (2006-2009) and an Associate Research Scientist post at the Energy, Environment and Water Research Centre of the Cyprus Institute (2009-2012). Her research interests lie within the area of fundamental and applied physics of novel materials which are promising for future energy-efficient technological applications, especially in the field of solar energy. More specifically and more recently, these include: Investigation of optoelectronic properties and degradation mechanisms of novel solar cell devices including multi-junction solar cells, nanostructured silicon cells, perovskites; Development of accurate standardized and non-standardised testing protocols for new solar cell technologies.
Maria has over 10 years’ experience in national and European research projects as a partner and as a Coordinator covering the full project life-cycle involvement: from initiation to implementation, monitoring and reporting. She led the efforts to attract funds and develop a new strategic infrastructure unit at the University of Cyprus, the DegradationLab, which focuses in the accurate characterization of new and emerging solar cells, and is currently the Head of this new lab (https://fosscy.eu/laboratories/degradation-lab/).
Dr. Anurag Krishna is an R&D Project Leader at Interuniversity Microelectronics Centre (IMEC) and EnergyVille, Belgium, where his research activities focus on developing perovskite module technology. Previously, he has been a Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellow in the laboratory of Prof. Anders Hagfeldt and Prof. Michael Graetzel at Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, Switzerland. He obtained Ph.D. from Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. The noble mission of his research is to facilitate sustainable and affordable low-carbon and green technology solutions for the world. On the fundamental side, his research interests focus on developing hybrid materials suitable for photovoltaic, optoelectronic, and nanoelectronic devices


A deep understanding of the atomistic mechanisms underlying different energy[1]related chemical processes requires recording large datasets under operando conditions, yielding key information about the working material. Therefore, the desired parameters to study include the chemical composition at the interface and bulk, the chemical states of the atoms and their variations resulting from the reactions, as well as the structural evolution. Unfortunately, the analytical techniques capable of providing information under reaction conditions are very limited since the complex environments often required for running the reaction are hardly compatible. Consequently, in many cases, only ex situ characterizations are feasible, leading to a loss of important information because the intermediates and active species cannot be “quenched” for post-process analysis. As a result, in situ/operando characterization has gained significant attention in recent years. X-ray characterization techniques provide bulk-to-surface information in an element-specific manner, which is usually not possible with other characterization techniques. However, these techniques, especially those based on photoelectrons, are not easily compatible with complex environments such as gases and liquids, requiring ultra-high vacuum for operation, particularly in the soft X-ray regime. This symposium will focus on the in situ and operando techniques developed for the investigation of energy materials under relevant working conditions using X-ray techniques.
- Electro- Thermo- Photo-catalysis
- Batteries
- Capacitors
- Flow batteries
Prof. Beatriz Roldán Cuenya is currently Director of the Interface Science Department at the Fritz Haber Institute of the Max Planck Society in Berlin (Germany). She is an Honorary Professor at the Technische Universität Berlin, at the Freie Universität Berlin, and at the Ruhr-University Bochum, all in Germany. Also, she serves as a Distinguished Research Professor at the University of Central Florida (USA).
Prof. Roldán Cuenya began her academic career by completing her M.S./B.S. in Physics with a minor in Materials Science at the University of Oviedo, Spain in 1998. Afterwards she moved to Germany and obtained her Ph.D. from the Department of Physics of the University of Duisburg-Essen with summa cum laude in 2001. Subsequently, she carried out her postdoctoral research in the Department of Chemical Engineering at the University of California Santa Barbara (USA) until 2003.
In 2004, she joined the Department of Physics at the University of Central Florida (UCF) as Assistant Professor where she moved through the ranks to become a full professor in 2012. In 2013 Prof. Roldan Cuenya, moved to Germany to become Chair Professor of Solid State Physics in the Department of Physics at Ruhr-University Bochum until 2017.
During her academic career, Prof. Roldan Cuenya received an Early CAREER Award from the US National Science Foundation (2005) and the international Peter Mark Memorial award from the American Vacuum Society (2009). In 2016 she became Fellow of the Max Planck Society in Germany and also received the prestigious Consolidator Award from the European Research Council. In 2020, she became a member of the Academia Europaea (Academy of Europe). She received the AVS Fellow Award (2021), the International Society of Electrochemistry-Elsevier Prize for Experimental Electrochemistry (2021), the 2022 Paul H. Emmet Award of the North American Catalysis Society, and the Röntgen Medal of the City of Remscheid (2022).
Prof. Roldan Cuenya is the author of more than 200 peer-reviewed publications, 6 book chapters, and 6 patents. She has given 245 invited talks, with 13 plenary talks and 33 keynote lectures since 2017. Her H-factor is 74 (Google Scholar) and her work has received over 21,500 citations.
She presently serves on the editorial advisory boards of the Journal of Catalysis and Chemical Reviews. In addition, she also contributes to a number of advisory committees, including the Liquid Sunlight Alliance (USA), the Advanced Research Center Chemical Building Blocks Consortium (Utrecht, the Netherlands), the Spanish Synchrotron Facility ALBA (Barcelona, Spain), the German Synchrotron DESY (Hamburg, Germany), the Helmholtz-Zentrum Berlin for the strategic development of BESSY II (Berlin, Germany), the Institute of Chemical Research of Catalonia (ICIQ in Tarragona, Spain), the UK Catalysis Hub and the Ertl Center for Electrochemistry & Catalysis (South Korea).
Prof. Roldan Cuenya’s research program explores physical and chemical properties of nanostructures, with emphasis on advancements in nanocatalysis based on operando microscopic and spectroscopic characterization.
Li-ion batteries are the dominant energy storage systems in electrified transportation, modern technology as well as renewable energy storage. However, these batteries require the use of scarce, toxic and unethically resourced materials for their fabrication. This pushes the need to develop novel and improved technologies, with an important consideration in their sustainability. This symposium focuses on batteries that not rely on toxic and/or scarce material aligned to sustainable development goal SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy) and/or SDG 13 (climate action). A clear example in this case it is Na batteries, but not limited to. The focus of this symposium is to bring together experts from around the world to discuss the latest advancements in battery technologies and their impact on the future landscape of energy. During the symposium, speakers will present recent research and developments in next-generation of sustainable batteries (e.g. sodium/potassium-based batteries, organic/polymer batteries, multivalent (Mg, Zn, Ca…) batteries, etc). Key topics such as safety, eco-design & recycling and environmental sustainability will also be addressed.
The next-generation battery symposium is a unique opportunity for researchers, engineers, and energy experts to exchange knowledge and experiences on the latest sustainable battery technologies and establish connections for future collaborations and projects.
- Sodium/potassium batteries
- Multivalent batteries (eg. Mg, Zn, Ca…)
- Organic/polymer batteries
- Aqueous rechargeable batteries
- Sustainability, eco-design and battery recycling
Dr. Rebeca Marcilla received her PhD in Chemistry in 2006 from the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) in the field of ionic liquids and polymers with application in electrochemistry and nanotechnology. After a postdoctoral stay at the University College London she joined CIDETEC (Centro de Tecnologías Electroquímicas, Donostia-San Sebastian). In 2010 she moved to the Unit of Electrochemical Processes IMDEA Energy (Madrid) and in 2015 she became Senior Researcher. During her fruitful scientific career, she has acquired proven experience in advanced materials for energy storage (eg. ionic liquids, polymer electrolytes, redox-active polymers, etc) and in next-generation batteries including organic batteries and redox flow batteries). As a result, she has co-authored 7 patents (1 of them licensed to a private company) and published more around 120 articles, achieving an h-index of 46. She has supervised 12 PhD thesis (6 presented+6 on-going) and several postdoctoral researchers. In 2017, she was awarded with a ERC Consolidator Grant to develop Membrane-free Redox Flow Batteries. Dr. Marcilla is member of the Governing Board of the Electrochemistry Group of the Spanish Royal Society of Chemistry (GEE-RSEQ) and Editor of Journal Power Sources.
A/Prof. Pozo-Gonzalo has worked at the Institute for Frontier Materials, Deakin University in Melbourne (Australia) for 11 years, and currently, she is an ARAID fellow, funded by the Aragon government, working at the Carboquimica Institute-CSIC on sustainable energy storage materials and technologies. She attained her Degree and honours at the University of Zaragoza (Spain). After graduating, she received her PhD degree in Chemistry from the University of Manchester (United Kingdom) working with Prof. Peter J. Skabara on the electrochemical synthesis of Conducting Polymers. From 2004, she joined the Centre for Electrochemical Technologies in San Sebastian, (Spain) as the Head of Electrooptical unit where she stayed for 7 years. After moving to Australia, she has been working with Prof. Alan Bond at Monash University and in 2012 she joined Deakin University where she has been working in reversible metal air battery with advanced electrolytes, ionic liquids funded by ARC Centre of Excellence for Electromaterials Science (ACES).
. Since 2018, she has been focusing on circular economy in energy materials, working on the recovery of critical raw materials from end of life devices using sustainable methods, as well as redesign of materials for energy. At Deakin University, she is also a theme champion for energy materials as part of the University’s Circular Economy mission pillar. She is a board member of the Journal Sustainable Chemistry and Associate Editor of RSC sustainability. During her research career, she has authored and co-authored 98 peer-review international publications, 3 book chapters and holds 4 patents, in the areas of electrochemistry, circular economy and energy storage. She has supervised 11 Postdoctoral Research Fellows, 13 PhD students (7 to completion, 5 current), and 11 undergraduate students. She has led a total of 36 projects, 14 of them with industry partners, and 5 prestigious European funded projects within different calls STRP-FP6, FP7-NMP, RISE generating a total income of more than AU$4M.
Robert Dominko is a Research Professor at the National Institute of Chemistry and a Professor at the University of Ljubljana. He is the head of the battery group at the National Institute of Chemistry and deputy director of the ALISTORE-ERI network. He obtained his Ph.D. in Materials sciences in 2002 from the University of Ljubljana. Since his Ph.D. study, his research interests are in the field of materials science and electrochemical systems for energy storage, with main activities in the field of modern battery systems. Between 2009 and 2010 he worked in UPJV, Amiens, where he started the development of Li-S batteries. He was the coordinator of two large-scale EU projects focused on the development of Li-S batteries. His current research interests are focused on different types of multivalent batteries and the implementation of smart functionalities in battery cells. He is strongly connected with the Battery 2030+ initiative and with Batteries Europe, where he is one of the co-leaders of the task force preparing a strategy on the education level. He is involved in the MESC master program (https://mesc-plus.eu/) and in the doctoral school DESTINY (https://www.destiny-phd.eu/). He is a member of the Slovenian Academy of Engineering.
Professor Emma Kendrick, CChem FIMMM FRSC FIMMM - Chair of Energy Materials, School of Metallurgy and Materials, University of Birmingham.
Prof Kendrick’s career to date has included industrial and academic roles leading to her current role as Chair of Energy Materials, where in add addition to group lead of the energy materials group (EMG), she is co-director of the Centre for Energy Storage (BCES) and part of Birmingham Energy institute (BEI) and Birmingham Centre for Strategic Elements and Critical Materials (BCSECM). The EMG investigates sustainability in novel battery technologies from materials, manufacturing, performance and parameterisation, and recycling. Her recent work has led to a 2021 joint UoB - Imperial College London (ICL) spin out company, based around the methods of experimental parameterisation of applied multi-physics cell models, called About:Energy, for which she is founder and director.
Prior to UoB, she spent two years as Reader in WMG, University of Warwick. Before academia, she led innovations in the battery industry, latterly as Chief Technologist in Energy Storage at SHARP Laboratories of Europe Ltd (SLE) and prior to that for two innovative lithium-ion battery SMEs, Fife Batteries Ltd and Surion Energy Ltd.
She is fellow of the Royal Society of chemistry (RSC) and Institute of Metals, Mining and Materials (IoM3). Recently, she has been recognised through several awards; 2021 Faraday Institution (FI) Researcher Development Champion, RSC 2021 Environment, Sustainability and Energy Division Mid-Career Award, and the 2019 Hothersall Memorial Award for outstanding services to Metal Finishing.
Prof Kendrick holds a PhD from Keele University, obtained as part of a postgraduate transfer partnership (PTP) scheme with CERAM Research, a MSc in new materials from the University of Aberdeen and a BSc in chemistry from the University of Manchester.
Dr. Nagore Ortiz-Vitoriano (https://cicenergigune.com/en/nagore-ortiz-vitoriano) is an Ikerbasque Research Associate, who has been spearheading metal-air research at CIC energiGUNE (Spain) since 2016, of which she became research line manager in 2018.
She obtained her doctorate in 2011 for her work on solid oxide fuel cells (University of the Basque Country, UPV/EHU, Spain), during the course of which she undertook research stays at Risø DTU (Denmark) and Imperial College London (UK). In 2013 she was awarded a Marie Curie International Outgoing Fellowship from the European Union, enabling her to join the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge (USA) where she worked with both lithium and sodium-air batteries. In 2015, she continued this fellowship at CIC energiGUNE, where she conducted research stays at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (USA), Deakin University (Australia) and Chalmers University (Sweden). Recently, she has been promoted to Ikerbasque Research Associate and granted the Ramon y Cajal fellowship financed by the European Commission's European Social Fund through the Spanish Ministry of Science and Innovation.
Dr. Ortiz-Vitoriano has focused on both rational design of electrode and electrolyte materials for energy storage (e.g., solid oxide fuel cells, electrocatalysis, Na-ion and metal-air batteries), as well as fundamental research focused on elucidating key processes (by establishing relevant physiochemical models) in order to facilitate rapid future developments at both the material and system levels.
Dr. Minghao Yu, PI, research group leader at Technische Universität Dresden. He received his doctoral degree in Material Physics and Chemistry from Sun Yat-sen University in June 2017. He joined Technische Universität Dresden as a postdoctoral researcher under the support of Humboldt Research Fellowship in November 2017. In March 2019, he was appointed as a research group leader of the Chair of Molecular Functional Materials at Technische Universität Dresden.
Nanomaterials are a powerhouse of innovation, and accelerating the development of new materials is vital for a sustainable society. Currently, new materials development in laboratories involves repeated cycles of conception, synthesis, and characterization, manually performed by researchers. The inclusion of machine learning, robotics, and big data into these cycles promises to revolutionize materials research and beyond. This symposium aims at bringing together experimentalists and theoreticians who are investigating various fundamental discoveries in robotic platforms, machine learning, computaional materials discovery and automated data collection. It provides a forum for discussing the latest scientific discoveries in these exciting new research areas bridging nanomaterial science with automated platforms and AI technologies
- Computational Materials Discovery
- Robotic Synthesis Platforms
- Machine Learning in Quantum Chemistry
- Automation of Calculations for Data Collection
Alex earned his Ph.D. in physics of semiconductors from Chernivtsi National University, Ukraine for his work on electronic properties of nitride semiconductor alloys.
In 2004 he joined the Quantum Semiconductors and Bionanophotonics lab at University of Sherbrooke as a postdoc, working on theoretical modeling of laser-assisted quantum well intermixing and self-assembly processes of organic monolayers on metal and semiconductor surfaces for applications in bio-sensing.
In 2008 he moved to Quantum Theory Group at National Research Council of Canada in Ottawa, where he worked on many-body problems in epitaxial and colloidal semiconductor and graphene quantum dots; in particular, simulations of multi-exciton generation, Auger processes and optical properties of nanocrystals used in hybrid polymer-semiconductor solar cells.
Alex joined Ted Sargent’s Nanomaterials for Energy Group in 2011 and worked on characterization and modeling of the semiconductor nanocrystal surfaces and developing the synthesis methods for nanomaterials with improved optical and transport properties for photovoltaics.
In 2018, Alex joined the Department of Physical and Environmental Sciences at the University of Toronto, Scarborough as an Assistant Professor in Clean Energy. His topics of interest are materials for energy storage and novel materials discovery using high-throughput experiments and machine learning.
Kangming Li is a post-doctoral fellow in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at University of Toronto. He received his PhD in Physics from Université Paris-Saclay, where he was a CEA-NUMERICS Fellow funded under the Marie Curie Actions. He was awarded the Dalla Torre Medal by the French Society for Metallurgy and Materials for his PhD work on finite-temperature magnetic effects in concentrated alloys. Currently he is using machine learning and high-throughput first principles calculations to accelerate the discovery of novel inorganic materials.
Born June 23, 1966 in Meppel, The Netherlands
Professor in Theoretical Chemistry, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Ph. D. (cum laude) University of Groningen (1993), postdoctoral stays at NASA Ames (1994-1995) and at the University of Odense (1996-1997). Professor at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (1998-present). Visiting professor stays at University of Strasbourg and at Pacific Northwest Laboratories. Awards: KNCV Clemens Roothaan Prize (1996), NWO vici (2005), WATOC Dirac Medal (2006).
Main research Interests
1. Subsystem electronic structure methods
2. Reducing the time-to-solution of computational models
3. Development and application of relativistic computational chemistry techniques
During the last few years, enormous efforts have been made in the understanding and development of solar chemical technologies, leading to important achievements in this field. The next step to implement these technologies as sustainable renewable alternatives is their scale-up and industrialization, representing a great challenge. This symposium is open to contributions on different routes towardssolar fuels generation using scaled-up technologies at an industrial level. It will cover topics from photoelectrocatalytic, photovoltaic, photocatalysis and concentrated solar power technologies. Additionally, contributions on the employment of Artificial Intelligence (A.I), Machine Learning and other digital technologies to ease and accelerate the lab-to-industry transition are also welcome.
- Photoelectrocatalysis
- Photovoltaics
- Photocatalysis
- Concentrated Solar Power
- Artificial photosynthesis
- Artificial Intelligence (A.I.) for accelerated scale-up