Materials and Device Physics for Solid-State Lighting and Renewable Energy Generation

Peifen Zhu

Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, University of Missouri

Abstract:

Efficient use of energy and renewable energy production are of paramount importance to society. Lighting accounts for one-eighth of total U.S. electricity consumption. Light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as a new generation lighting technology have extremely long-life spans and consume much less energy. They are penetrating our daily life and adoption of this technology is expected to reduce energy consumption by 40% in 2030.  Despite rapid advances, LED technology is still in its early stage, and continued innovation and breakthroughs are needed to achieve the full potential of this technology. The relatively higher initial cost of LED over incumbent light sources is hindering the widespread adoption of this technology. Therefore, the utilization of cost-effective approaches to achieve high-efficiency LED is instrumental in the application of this technology in the general illumination market. The periodic nanostructures by low-cost self-assembly process were implemented on both LED and OLED, which resulted in a significant enhancement in power efficiency. The key advantage of the self-assembly process is the ability for implementation of roll-to-roll printing method for large wafer-scale manufacturing processes. Developing efficient, stable, and narrow linewidth down-converter materials as well as engineering the properties of existing materials, which can combine with blue LED chips to generate white light with high color quality, will speed up the adoption of LED in the general illumination market. Both material development and additive manufacturing of white LEDs will be presented. Photocatalysis of CO2 is an environmentally friendly and promising technology to convert CO2 into value-added chemical fuels using solar energy. However, the conversion efficiency is low due to the complex reactions. The efforts to improve the CO2 adsorption capacity, light absorption, and charge separation will also be covered.