PhD Position New Luminescent Materials for Sustainable Energy Technology: Towards Electricity Generating Windows

You will combine your creativity with analytical- and experimantal skills to discover new electricity generating luminescent window coatings. You will publish new fundamental solid state physics and optics processes and explore options for scale-up of your new coatings with a start-up and the glass industry. More info on the topics of the research group can be found at www.vanderkolklab.com
In this PhD project you will develop luminescent materials for building integrated photovoltaic (BIPV) technology. You will make and study new types of strongly absorbing luminescent solar absorber materials of just a few hundred nm thick, that can convert the UV+VIS part of the solar spectrum into infra-red luminescence. When applied as a coating to windows, these materials can enable a cost-effective electricity generating PV-window following the principle of a Luminescent Solar Concentrator (LSC). A LSC can harvest sunlight by absorbing, re-emitting, and subsequently guiding light, like in an optical fibre, to solar cells integrated in the windowpane that convert the light in electric power.
To successfully develop new valuable luminescent absorber materials, it is crucial you will get fundamental understanding of the physical processes underlying the luminescence mechanism of the materials. One of the scientific challenges is to understand how generated electron-hole pairs can transfer their energy to the luminescence centres. The strongest possible absorptions in an inorganic material are so-called bandgap absorptions in which an electron is excited from the valence band (VB) to the conduction band (CB) leaving behind a hole in the VB. Although there are many materials (hosts) with a small bandgap that absorb the entire visible part of the solar spectrum (black materials), very few show efficient luminescence of doping ions. Host-to-doping ion energy transfer is often described by a resonant process between (self-trapped) exciton emission and doping ion absorption. The materials of this project have a smaller bandgap and are selected to have a small exciton binding energy causing transfer involving excitons to be inefficient. In the new materials, sequential transfer of first the electron followed by the hole is the anticipated transfer process to the luminescence centres.
The fundamental insights are obtained first by time and temperature resolved optical and luminescence spectroscopy combined with a variety of techniques to analyse the structure, (defect) composition and morphology of the films. Secondly fundamental understanding involves data interpretation and model development using knowledge of solid-state physics, optics and quantum mechanics. Ideally the obtained insights will be used to select other materials with improved properties during your project.
In this project you will learn the ins and outs of reactive DC, RF and pulsed magnetron sputtering, the working horse technology in glass coating industry, to make the luminescence materials. Targeted materials are rare earth (like Yb) and transition metal (like Mn) doped inorganic semiconducting materials, emitting in the infra-red spectral range, where silicon solar cells have high conversion efficiency.
The Luminescence Materials group at Delft University of Technology has more than 30 years of experience with luminescent materials research and collaborates with a start-up company and glass coating industry to facilitate a route to large scale application of the coatings as windows. You will be working in a team, headed by your promotor, with other PhD's, technicians, a start-up company and glass coating industry. A PhD student receives a general education by the University Graduate School and can be involved in activities like teaching practicals for a small part of your time and co-supervise graduation project at the bachelor and master level.

Requirements:

You enjoy solving complex challenges related to for example solid state physics and optics.
After a well defined start of your PhD project with pre-selected materials and methods we expect you to take the lead in your project more and more to solve unexpected problems and use your growing knowledge, experience and creativity to discover new exciting materials. We strive to actively support your professional growth and project skills to enable you to utilise your full potential.
Please show in your motivation letter and CV that you have

• a university master in physics or a master specialised in inorganic (physical) chemistry.
• strong analytical skills to develop models describing luminescence mechanisms and fit models to experimental data.
• a proven interest in, and experience with, experimental (materials) research.

It is beneficial but not mandatory to have experience with any of the topics mentioned in the job description. 
Doing a PhD at TU Delft requires English proficiency at a certain level to ensure that the candidate is able to communicate and interact well, participate in English-taught Doctoral Education courses, and write scientific articles and a final thesis. For more details please check the Graduate Schools Admission Requirements.

Salary Benefits:

Doctoral candidates will be offered a 4-year period of employment in principle, but in the form of 2 employment contracts. An initial 1,5 year contract with an official go/no go progress assessment within 15 months. Followed by an additional contract for the remaining 2,5 years assuming everything goes well and performance requirements are met.
Salary and benefits are in accordance with the Collective Labour Agreement for Dutch Universities, increasing from € 2872 per month in the first year to € 3670 in the fourth year. As a PhD candidate you will be enrolled in the TU Delft Graduate School. The TU Delft Graduate School provides an inspiring research environment with an excellent team of supervisors, academic staff and a mentor. The Doctoral Education Programme is aimed at developing your transferable, discipline-related and research skills.
The TU Delft offers a customisable compensation package, discounts on health insurance, and a monthly work costs contribution. Flexible work schedules can be arranged.
For international applicants, TU Delft has the Coming to Delft Service. This service provides information for new international employees to help you prepare the relocation and to settle in the Netherlands. The Coming to Delft Service offers a Dual Career Programme for partners and they organise events to expand your (social) network.

40 hours per week

Mekelweg 2