Research

Research at Professor Qi's EMSS Unit

Challenges associated with energy supply and global warming have raised public awareness of the need for alternative “green” energy supplies. The Energy Materials and Surface Sciences (EMSS) Unit is developing the next generation low-cost, high-performance energy harvesting (e.g. perovskite solar cells) and storage (e.g. Lithium ion batteries) technologies out of functional materials (e.g. organic–inorganic hybrid perovskites materials, organic semiconductors). These perovskite solar cells are lightweight, flexible, and can be printed roll-to-roll like newsprint to cover windows, walls, and many other surfaces. The EMSS Unit also uses state-of-the-art advanced material characterization instruments and a clean-room device fabrication facility to investigate properties of novel materials and their surfaces/interfaces to innovate device structures for better performance.

Energy Materials

Energy Materials are the focus of research at EMSS Unit at OIST. Principally focusing on perovskite solar cells, we make full use of the OIST Graduate University's high-technology clean room to fabricate solar cell devices. Combining lithography, metal and organic deposition, sputtering, etching, spin-coating, as well as precise testing, we are able to fabricate devices under controlled conditions that will allow rapid transition for our discoveries from the laboratory to the real world.

Surface Sciences

Surface Sciences are the pathway to elevating understanding and advancing the application of Energy Materials such as organic–inorganic hybrid perovskites materials and organic semiconductors. EMSS Unit applies cutting edge surface science to provide the cleanest environment for studying the surfaces and interfaces that are critical to the preparation of perovskite solar cells and other energy devices (e.g. Lithium ion batteries). We apply a combination of state-of-the-art in-situ ultrahigh vacuum techniques as well as ex-situ advanced material characterization techniques for accurate and reliable understanding of electronic interfaces in pristine and also real-world environments.

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