Dept. of Materials Science and Engineering Spring Seminar Series: Susanna Thon

Description

Susanna Thon, an associate professor of electrical and computer engineering at Johns Hopkins, will give a talk titled "Spectral Engineering of Nanomaterials for Flexible Photovoltaics and Sensors" for the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.

Abstract:

This presentation will discuss emerging technologies based on spectrally-engineered nanomaterials that take advantage of the configurable nature and quantum properties of these materials to harvest and sense solar energy. Spectrally selective materials are of great interest for optoelectronic devices in which wavelength-selectivity of the photoactive material is necessary for applications such as multi-junction solar cells, narrow-band photodetectors, transparent photovoltaics, and tailored emission sources. Specific materials platforms that will be discussed include colloidal quantum dots, plasmonic metasurfaces, and 2D materials which have potential in new flexible, lightweight, high-efficiency solar technology platforms with light-collecting capabilities tailored for mobile and other off-grid applications. Several avenues for achieving controlled transparency or opacity within multiple wavelength bands in the absorption, reflection, and transmission spectra of colloidal quantum dot films, as well as multi-modal spatially-resolved characterization methods that can be used to train machine learning models for parameter prediction in materials and devices will be discussed.