
There is a large social need for renewable energy in the country especially solar energy. With about 300 clear, sunny days in a year, India’s theoretically calculated solar energy incidence on its land area alone is about 5,000 trillion kilowatt-hours (kWh) per year (or 5 EWh/yr). The development of next generation, high efficiency and stable solar cells will enable us to provide power in remote areas of the country and therefore will have a large social and technological impact. The recent emergence of efficient solar cells based on organic/inorganic lead halide perovskite absorbers promises to transform the fields of dye-sensitized, organic, and thin film solar cells.
Perovskite Single Crystal based Photodetector:
Perovskite single-crystal, which exhibit exceptionally low trap density and nearly perfect transnational symmetry, are believed to achieve the highest performance of perovskite-based optoelectronic devices. Here, we fabricate several lead free perovskite single crystals for photodetector, X-Ray detector and non-linear optical application. We also study their charge carrier dynamics by temperature dependent photo luminescence spectroscopy, femtosecond transient absorption and photo luminescence spectroscopy, impedance spectroscopy, and electron spin resonance spectroscopy. The final goal of this project is to fabricate perovskite based highly sensitive photodetector.
Team Members: Naveen, Deepak, Dipankar, Jagdish, Pranjal
Perovskite Nano Crystal for Photocatalysis and Terahertz Spectroscopy:
Perovskite colloidal nanocrystals have extraordinary potential as light emitters and photocatalyst. They exhibit high photoluminescence quantum yields (PLQYs), and the emission color can be finely tuned across the entire visible spectrum by changing the proportions of mixed halide anions. In our group, we fabricate and characterize different ligand assisted perovskite nanocrystals and study their charge carrier dynamic by Terahertz Pump-Probe spectroscopy. These nanocrystals are used for photocatalytic dye degradation and water splitting application.
Team Members: Rajashik, Smruti, Partha
Carrier Dynamics in Two-Dimensional Perovskite:
Two-dimensional (2D) Ruddlesden–Popper perovskite materials gained importance due to its higher photo stability, when compared to its three-dimensional (3D) counterpart. In our group, we study the exciton binding energy, charge carrier recombination, charge carrier transport, and conductivity as a function of different organic and inorganic spacer cations chain length in these 2D quantum wells. We probe the fundamental photophysics in these 2D perovskite by different advanced spectroscopic techniques like transient spectroscopy and terahertz spectroscopy. The final goal of this project is to fabricate efficient and highly stable blue LED.
Team Members: Yukta, Nabasindhu, Vignesh
Singlet Fission:
Singlet exciton fission-sensitized solar cells have the potential to exceed the Shockley-Queisser limit by generating additional photocurrent from high-energy photons. Here, in our group we try to understand the underlying photophysics behind singlet fission in organic semiconductor and conjugated polymers on sub 100s timescale by femtosecond transient absorption spectroscopy. The ultimate goal of this project is to make next generation silicon/perovskite tandem solar cells.
Team Members: Tejasvini, Akshay, Utkarsh
Materials Informatics:
Materials models and simulation tools are necessary in order to eliminate trial-and-error loops during the development of materials, components and manufacturing processes, to illustrate complex load scenarios and to make reliable predictions of the behavior of existing materials and components as well as for those in the process of development.
We work with the theoretical predication of various properties of different materials using Machine Learning which can be used in place of other computational methods like DFT. Apart from that, we work with several Multiphysics software to simulate the biological and other environments to study the effect of Materials in them. For example – Study of Chromium doped Ferrous Oxide in treatment of Adenocarcinoma and many such projects.
Team Members: Utkarsh, Akshay, Vignesh, Sovesh, Prabal
Related Publications:
[1] “Effect of size and charge asymmetry on aggregation kinetics of oppositely charged nanoparticles”, Kulveer Singh, Anubhav Raghav, Prateek K Jha, Soumitra Satapathi, Just Accepted, Nature Scientific Reports, 9 (1), 3762, 2019.
[2] “Charge Carrier Dynamics Study and Morphology Optimization in Solvent Annealed CH3NH3PbI3 Perovskite for Air Processed Stable Solar Cell Application”, Anubhav Raghav, Shivam Singh, Dhanashree Moghe, Shailendra Sharma, Dinesh Kabra, Soumitra Satapathi, Chemical Physics, https://doi.orgmphys/10.1016/j.che.2019.110408, 2019.
[3] “Morphological and photophysical study in hybrid ternary organic nanoparticles blends”, Anubhav Raghav, Mrinmoy K Chini, Amar Bheemaraju, Rajashik Paul, Soumitra Satapathi, Chemical Physics, 525, 110388, 2019.
[4] “Temperature Assisted Nucleation and Growth to Optimize Perovskite Morphology at Liquid Interface: A Study by Electrochemical Impedance Spectroscopy”, Priya Srivastava, Anukul Prasad Parhi, R Ranjan, Soumitra Satapathi, Monojit Bag, ACS Applied Energy Materials, 4420–4425, 1, 9, 2018.
[5] “Local optoelectronic characterization of solvent annealed lead-free bismuth-based perovskite films”, Jill Wenderott, Anubhav Raghav, Max Shtein, Peter Green, Soumitra Satapathi, , Langmuir, 7647-7654, 34, 26, 2018.
[6] “Controllable Bulk Heterojunction Morphology by Self-Assembly of Oppositely Charged Nanoparticles”,Kulveer Singh, Prateek K. Jha, and Soumitra Satapathi, Journal of Physical Chemistry C, 121, 16045−16050, 2017.
[7]“Controlling morphology of CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite film by dual solvent elimination method”, Anubhav Raghav, Shivam Singh, Shailendra Kumar Sharma, Kabra Dinesh, Monojit Bag, Soumitra Satapathi, Nano-Structures & Nano-Objects, 12, 106–112, 2017.
[8] “Synthesis of Nanoparticles of P3HT and PCBM for Optimizing Morphology in Polymeric Solar Cells”, Soumitra Satapathi, Hardeep Singh Gill, Lian Li, Lynne Samukeson, Jayant Kumar,* Ravi Mosurkal, Applied Surface Science, 323, 3–18, 2014.
[9] “Photophysical Study of P3HT/NDI Based Hybrid Nanoparticles”, Soumitra Satapathi, Mijanur Rahaman Molla, Santanu Bhattacharya, Suhrit Ghosh and Amitava Patra, European Journal of Physics D, , 2014, 68:350, 2014.
[10] “Effect of functional groups on sensitization of dye-sensitized solar cells (DSSCs) using free base Porphyrins”, Nivedita Choudhary, Nipun Sahwney, Anubhav Raghav, M. Sankar, Soumitra Satapathi, Journal of Porphyrins and Phthalocyanines, 21, 222, 2017.
[11] “Utilization of Naturally Occurring Dyes as Sensitizers in Dye Sensitized Solar Cells.” Nipun Sawhney, Soumitra Satapathi, IEEE Photovoltaics, 7, 2, 539-544, 2017. [Featured in Nature Asia, PTI, Quartz, BBC, Chemical Today].