ERC Starting Grant awarded to Antonio Abate
Antonio Abate is an internationally renowned perovskite researcher. © J. Böhm/HZB
Gold contacts are applied to the perovskite layer. © W. Zuo/HZB
HZB scientist Dr. Antonio Abate has been awarded an ERC Starting Grant for his research project on perovskite solar cells. The ERC Starting Grant supports outstanding researchers in an early phase of their scientific careers with up to 1.5 million euros over five years and is considered one of the most important European awards.
Abate heads a Helmholtz Young Investigator Group at the HZB on organometallic perovskite solar cells since 2017. He was a member of Prof. Henry Snaith’s team at the University of Oxford when they achieved a step increase to eleven per cent in the efficiency level. Since then, perovskite solar cells have achieved efficiencies of more than twenty per cent. No other material class has shown such a rapid increase in photovoltaic effiency so far.
Abate is investigating processes both within the layer and at its interfaces. He intends to use the ERC Starting Grant to develop perovskite layers in which the environmentally harmful lead atoms can be replaced by less problematic elements.
He prevailed in a rigorous application selection process. 3,170 applications for the Starting Grants were received from all over Europe, of which 403 were approved. This represents a selection rate of about 13 percent.
“Our sincerest congratulations to Antonio Abate for this great success! In recent years, we at HZB have significantly intensified our efforts in the field of perovskite research and established several groups, because good research also needs critical mass in order to achieve synergy effects”, says Prof. Bernd Rech, acting Scientific Director of the HZB.
- CIGS-perovskite tandem cell achieves record efficiency of 25.5 %A Berlin-based team from HZB and Center for the Science of Materials Berlin (CSMB) at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin has set a new record for a tandem solar cell. Using a combination of a CIGS semiconductor layer and perovskite, along with several optimised intermediate layers, they were able to convert 25.5% of sunlight into electrical energy. The previous record for this combination of materials and this size of cell stood at 24.6%. The new record has been certified and is visible in the prestigious Solar Cell Efficiency Tables (the "Green Tables"), which serve as the definitive ledger for the global photovoltaic community.
- Disorder creates new properties in compound semiconductorsAn international research team has demonstrated that the intrinsic disorder of the compound semiconductor CuInSnS₄ can be exploited to influence its optical properties. While the atomic vibrations also sense the local disorder, their response is averaged over many different local environments and therefore appear isotropic, as expected for a cubic crystal. In contrast, the optical excitations, known as excitons, are much more sensitive to the local arrangement of atoms. Surprisingly, they show a direction-dependent optical response even though the average crystal structure is cubic. These findings shed new light on the relationship between disorder and material properties, opening up new options for targeted 'disorder engineering' in optoelectronic and photocatalytic devices.
- Perovskite solar cells: Predictions of long-term stabilityReliable statements about the long-term stability of perovskite solar cells are still difficult to make. However, a new study by Dr Carolin Ulbrich’s team, published in the renowned journal Joule, highlights which methods are useful for this purpose and identifies areas where further research is needed.