Hot polaron photovoltaics

We are fabricating photovoltaically active compounds from correlated oxide materials such as perovskites to explore a fundamentally new energy conversion strategy. It aims to exploit the material properties of perovskites and their correlated dynamics in the light-induced excitations to stabilize the excited hot charge carriers.

This stabilization is seen in an increased life-time (Ƭ) of the hot carriers. It can be understood as the formation of long-living polaronic states through the enhanced coupling between coherent electrons and phonons. The increased life-time allows to separate the charges at the interface and generate a photocurrent (I(U=0)≠0) before the carriers thermalize. The photovoltaic properties, for example the current-voltage curves, from where the photocurrent can be extracted, are measured in an photovoltaic setup.