One of the major social concerns that has plagued humanity for centuries is the energy issue. Humanity must search for alternate renewable and clean energy sources as the supply of non-renewable energy sources declines. Among all renewable energy sources, including hydro, wind, bio, and ocean energy, the total amount of solar energy that the Earth gets each year—which is between 7000 and 8000 times than the annual global primary energy consumption—retains a distinguishing prominent position. Obviously, the ideal solution to the current energy issues is the development of solar energy.
The most widespread solar cells are typically inorganic and wafer-based, currently. However, it is generally known that installing solar panels requires a considerable amount of land, which not only raises the cost but also might reduce global biodiversity. Our group is focusing on the research of thin-film solar cells as opposed to these typical wafer-based solar cells. We are also creating several methods for solution-based solar cell generation in order to lower the cost of the manufacturing processes. More specifically, dye-sensitive solar cells and perovskite solar cells are the two types of solution process-based solar cells on which we are now working.