The Engineering & Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) have awarded an Early Career Research Fellowship to Dr Ross Hatton to develop window electrodes for the emerging generation of thin film photovoltaics (PVs).

PV devices convert sunlight directly into electricity and form an increasingly important part of the global renewable energy landscape. Today's PVs are based on conventional semiconductors which are energy-intensive to produce and restricted to rigid flat plate designs. The next generation of PVs will be based on very thin films of semiconductors that can be processed from solution at low temperature, which opens the door to exceptionally low cost manufacturing processes and new application areas not available to today's rigid flat plate PVs, particularly in the areas of transportation and buildings integration. However, this potential can only be achieved if the electrode that allows light into these devices is low cost and flexible, and at present no electrode technology meets both the cost constraint and technical specifications needed. Dr Hatton's Fellowship will focus on addressing this complex and inherently interdisciplinary challenge.

The UK is a global leader in the development of next generation PVs with a growing number of companies now focused on bringing them to market, and so the outputs of the proposed programme of research have strong potential to directly increase the economic competitiveness of the UK in this young sector, whilst also helping to address the now time critical challenge of climate change due to global warming.

An Engineering & Physical Science Research Council (EPSRC) Early Career Fellowship is a personal award, designed to provide the recipient with the necessary support to establish or further develop themselves as a leader of the future.