Innovators Under 35
I18. Michael Saliba, 34
Swiss
Federal Institute of Technology
Finding ways to make promising
perovskite-based solar cells practical.
Crystalline-silicon
panels—which make up about 90 percent of deployed photovoltaics—are expensive,
and they’re already bumping up against efficiency limits in converting sunlight
to electricity. So a few years ago, Michael Saliba, a researcher at the Swiss
Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, set out to investigate a new type
of solar cell based on a family of materials known as perovskites. The first
so-called perovskite solar cells, built in 2009, promised a cheaper,
easier-to-process technology. But those early perovskite-based cells converted
only about 4 percent of sunlight into electricity.
Saliba improved
performance by adding positively charged ions to the known perovskites. He has
since pushed solar cells built of the stuff to over 21 percent efficiency and
shown the way to versions with far higher potential.
—Russ Juskalian
—Russ Juskalian
MIT TECHNOLOGY REVIEW
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