Optimizing the Performance of Sensitized Solar Cells (Printed Electronics & Photovoltaics Europe 2010)

Juan Bisquert (BSc. Physics 1985, Ph.D. Physics Valencia 1992) is full professor of Applied Physics at Universitat Jaume I de Castelló, where he leads the Group of Photovoltaic and Optoelectronic Devices of 14 physicists and chemists. He has published more than 190 papers and book chapters in major journals, and has directed more than 20 research projects, including the Consolider project "Hybrid Optoelectronic Devices for Renewable Energy" (HOPE). He is a referee for more than 40 international journals, member of the editorial board of Energy and Environmental Science, and referee for research projects evaluation in 10 countries. Recent research activity was focused on nanoscale device for production and storage of clean energies, in particular photovoltaic devices and organic LEDs based on nanostructured metal oxides and organic conductors. Bisquert is specialist in theoretical modelling and interpretation of impedance spectroscopy of electroactive films, transport in disordered materials, interfacial charge-transfer, and the glass transition. He has built up a strong international reputation on the application of measurement techniques and physical modeling that relate the device operation with the elementary steps that take place at the nanoscale dimension: charge transfer, carrier transport, chemical reaction, etc. Especially the use of techniques of impedance spectroscopy has shown to be very useful to understand fundamental electronic phenomena in complex situations, such as in porous nanoscaled morphology. These methods are currently being applied to dye-sensitized solar cells, aligned ZnO nanowires structures, efficient charge injection and transport in organic LEDs, and solid-state photovoltaic devices. Bisquert'lab is currently developing advances in stability and efficiency of dye-sensitized solar cell devices, testing new dyes, sensitivization with quantum dots, and generally improving the device operation in connection with industrial initiatives. Bisquert and colleagues have also formed a small spin-off company, Xop Física, that develops a water sensor for agriculture applications.

The University Jaume I of Castelló is a public educational and research center created in the year 1991, which possesses little more than 13.000 students and which pursue the social, economic and cultural development of the society of its environment across the creation and transmission of knowledge. The University Jaume I dedicates a special effort to the research and the development, conscious of their importance in the educational quality and in the real interaction between university and society. The University Jaume I is one of the first universities of Spain obtaining external resources for research and development.