Dr Tim Batten and Dr Ian Hayward represented Renishaw at the recent PSCO-2017 conference on perovskite solar cells and optoelectronics hosted by The Mathematical Institute, Oxford, UK.
Perovskites—normally in the form of hybrid organic-metal lead/tin halides—exhibit promise as solar cell materials, and offer advantages over the more common crystalline silicon. For example, you can coat substrates from solution or by deposition and produce low-cost large-area cells. You can also deposit them on other cell types to produce tandem cells that have a greater light harvesting capability. However, there are potential problems, such as poor long-term stability.