Perovskite-Info: the perovskite experts

Researchers from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Hyderabad, India, have fabricated a perovskite-based low-cost, ultra-sensitive device that is capable of detecting the cardiac biomarker troponin T protein. Troponin T is a cardiac protein that is released into the bloodstream after a heart attack.

Unlike the commercially available test that can detect the protein at nanogram per ml concentration, this device can reportedly detect the protein at an extremely low concentration of femto gram per ml. This could help pave the way for early diagnosis of a heart attack, increasing a patient’s survival rate. It even has the potential to be able to predict the onset of a heart attack.

gpvdm is a free cross-platform opto-electronic device simulation tool that can simulate many device types, including OPVs and OLED devices.

In its latest version, the developers added support for perovskite solar cells. The software tool contains both electrical model and optical models to produce accurate and predictive device simulations. For more information on gpvdm click here.

Oxford PV recently announced first close of Series D funding round, attracting major new investment and continued support from existing shareholders. The Company raised £31 Million - around $41 Million USD.

The round includes a major new investment from Goldwind, the leading provider of integrated renewable energy solutions in China, as well as investment from existing shareholders including Equinor and Legal & General Capital.

Researchers from North Carolina State University have developed a microfluidic system for synthesizing perovskite quantum dots across the entire spectrum of visible light. The system is said to drastically reduce manufacturing costs, can be tuned on demand to any color and allows for real-time process monitoring to ensure quality control.

Quantum dots (QDs) are promising materials for applications ranging from biological sensing and imaging to LED displays and solar energy harvesting. The new system can be used to continuously manufacture high-quality QDs for use in these applications. "We call this system the Nanocrystal (NC) Factory, and it builds on the NanoRobo microfluidic platform that we unveiled in 2017," says Milad Abolhasani, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at NC State and corresponding author of the study.

Researchers from Peking University have conducted an experiment which is said to have demonstrated large-area perovskite solar cells are more stable 35 km up than at ground level. The researchers tested the stability of the devices by sending them to an altitude of 35 km above the Inner Mongolia autonomous region of China using an high-altitude balloon.

The cells, which had an active area of 1 cm², were developed with a TiO2 mesoporous structure based on two mixed-cation perovskites, FA0.9Cs0.1PbI3 and FA0.81MA0.10Cs0.04PbI2.55Br0.40. “Moreover, different kinds of perovskite photoactive absorbers with and without UV filters were investigated”, the scientists said.

Korea East-West Power and Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) have jointly launched a project to develop an ultra-high efficiency multi-junction solar cell using perovskite.

The company announced that researchers from the two organizations held the first meeting at its head office in Ulsan and discussed the technology of producing a standard cell (15.6×15.6 square centimeters)-sized large-scale solar panel by establishing a vacuum deposition semiconductor facility.

An international research team has developed a new method of synthesizing miniature light sources. The method is based on a unique laser which produces millions of nanolasers from a perovskite film in a few minutes. Such lasers look like small disks, work at room temperature and have a tunable emission wavelength from 550 to 800 nm. The high speed and good reproducibility of this method make it promising for the industrial production of single nanolasers as well as whole chains.

A scheme of the synthesis and operation and an image of the final nanolasers

Such miniature light sources or nanolasers are required, for example, for producing optical chips that could process information in next-gen devices. However, making such light sources is generally not that easy due to unstable materials, as well as the complex and expensive fabrication methods, which are difficult to control and adjust for industrial production. The scientists from ITMO, the Far Eastern Federal University, Texas University at Dallas, and the Australian National University have found a new way to solve this problem. They have developed a method that may enable the creation of millions of nanolasers from an optically active halide perovskites in a few minutes.