Organic, and more recently metal-halide perovskite semiconductors are redefining how functional electronic materials are processed for next-generation optoelectronic devices. Despite their distinct chemistries, these materials share common attributes, including exceptional optoelectronic performance, solution processability, and manufacturing paradigms that are intrinsically lower-cost and more versatile than incumbent inorganic semiconductors. Together, they offer transformative opportunities for sustainable energy technologies, advanced displays, wearable electronics, and emerging bioelectronic platforms. This symposium will connect diverse research communities to address common scientific and technological challenges that limit the translation of these materials from laboratory demonstrations to scalable, reliable technologies, providing a forum to discuss recent advances in materials design, manufacturing, and device processing across organic, perovskite, and hybrid organic inorganic semiconductor systems. Particular emphasis will be placed on the use of earth-abundant materials and low-toxicity solvent systems, directly addressing sustainability and environmental considerations that are increasingly central to emerging technologies. Contributions are welcomed that explore novel processing strategies enabling the transformation of advanced materials into device-relevant forms, alongside forward looking manufacturing concepts and lifecycle analyses of materials and devices. By positioning processing innovation as a unifying framework, this symposium aims to catalyse cross-disciplinary exchange and accelerate the development of sustainable, high-impact optoelectronic technologies
- Processing innovation
- Organic semiconductors
- Perovskite semiconductors
- Hybrid materials
- Sustainable manufacturing
- Low-toxicity solvents
- Earth-abundant materials
- Device integration
- Lifecycle analysis
- Scalable processing
Martyn McLachlan is Professor of Materials Science in the Department of Materials at Imperial College London, where he leads research at the interface of materials chemistry, physics, and engineering. His work focuses on the design, synthesis, and characterisation of advanced functional materials for energy conversion and optoelectronic applications, including metal-halide perovskites, metal oxide semiconductors, and hybrid systems. At Imperial he is the current Director of the EPSRC funded Centre for Doctoral Training in the Advanced Characterisation of Materials and serves as an elected College Consul, representing the Faculty of Engineering and the Buisiness School.
A core theme of his research is understanding how processing conditions influence structure and device performance, developing fundamental insights into thin-film formation, defect control, and interfacial phenomena. Martyn’s group employs state-of-the-art analytical techniques to study surfaces and buried interfaces, linking nanoscale chemistry and physics to macroscopic device behaviour. Beyond research, Martyn is passionate about mentorship and community building.
Thomas D. Anthopoulos is a Professor of Emerging Electronics at the University of Manchester in the UK. Following the award of his BEng and PhD degrees, he spent two years at the University of St. Andrews (UK), where he worked on organic semiconductors for application in light-emitting diodes before joining Philips Research Laboratories in The Netherlands to focus on printable microelectronics. From 2006 to 2017, he held faculty positions at Imperial College London (UK), first as an EPSRC Advanced Fellow and later as a Reader and full Professor of Experimental Physics. From 2017 to 2023, he was a Professor of Material Science at King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) in Saudi Arabia.
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.
Vida Engmann obtained her Dr. rer. nat in 2014 from the Ilmenau University of Technology under the supervision of Prof. Dr. Gerhard Gobsch. In 2014 she joined the OPV group at Mads Clausen Institute of University of Southern Denmark as a postdoctoral researcher. In 2017 she was appointed assistant professor and in 2020 as associate professor, with the focus on degradation and additive-assisted stabilization of organic solar cells. Her international research stays include Uppsala University, University of Colorado Boulder / NREL, and Russian Academy of Sciences Chernogolovka. In 2019 she received the Danish UNESCO-L'Oréal For Women in Science award and in 2020 the UNESCO L'Oréal International Rising Talent award.
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
Daniel Packwood