Nanotechnology for Solar Energy Conversion ‒ LESO-PB ‐ EPFL

Group leader: Dr. Andreas Schueler
PhD students: Jérémy Fleury,
Postdoc: Anna Krammer
Research eng.: Luc Burnier, Maxime Lagier
Technical support: Pierre Loesch

Due to their fascinating optical and electronical properties, nanometer-scaled structures play an important role in solar energy conversion. In our research group at EPFL’s Solar Energy Laboratory LESO-PB, we develop novel micro- and nanostructured smart materials for active and passive solar energy applications being integrated into the building envelope. We focus on thin films, because these allow covering a large surface area with a small quantity of raw material – and we focus on their electronic and optical properties, because these closely interrelated properties are most important for the utilisation of solar energy.

Nanocomposite coatings consist typically of dielectric, semiconductor or metal nanocrystals being embedded in a dielectric matrix. Effective medium theories such as the Bruggeman and the Ping Sheng theories are used to model the dielectric function of nanocomposite materials. Micro- and/or nanostructuring materials can result in very interesting features such as tuneable band-gaps by quantum confinement, adjustable complex dielectric function, enhanced mechanical stability, superhydrophobicity, frequency-selective surfaces FSS, etc. The semiconductor-to-metal transition observed in transition metal oxides with strong electron correlations can be exploited for smart switching coatings.

The scope of envisaged solar energy applications is large. Recent work focuses especially on smart materials, such as thermochromic selective solar absorber coatings for overheating protection of solar thermal systems, and electrochromic coatings for switchable windows. Further applications include novel microstructured glazing with strong seasonal dependence of the solar heat gains, photoluminescent quantum dot solar concentrators for photovoltaic energy conversion, antireflection coatings on solar collector glazing, colored coatings with high solar transmittance for novel glazing of photovoltaic facades, selective solar absorber coatings for thermal solar collectors and thermoelectric power generation, as well as novel insulating glazing with high transmittance for the microwaves of mobile communication.

solar panel with mirror effect and etched writing

Research topics

Patents

WO2017134589 (A1) : Coating for optical and electronic applications – Single- or multilayered coating, such as a selective solar absorber coating or a coating being part of an integrated electronic circuit, comprising one or more layers containing germanium (Ge) doped VO2+x, where -0.1 ≤ x ≤ 0.1.
Krammer Anna, Paone Antonio, Schüler Andreas

PCT/IB2017/051952: Solar cooker
Mauree Dasaraden, Schueler Andreas, Diévart Alexandre, Bouvard Olivia

WO2014024146 EP2882921 – Glazing with embedded microstructures for daylighting and seasonal thermal control,
Kostro André, Schüler Andreas

WO 2014045141 A2: Laminated glazing with coloured reflection and high solar transmittance suitable for solar energy systems
Le Caër Hody Virginie, Schüler Andreas (Déposant SwissInso SA)

WO 2014045144 A1: Interference filter with angular independent orange colour of reflection and high solar transmittance, suitable for roof-integration of solar energy systems
Webtool

www.glassdbase.ch – an independent and comprehensive building glass database set up by University of Basel, Switzerland and now managed by LESO-PB

PhD Theses

Bouvard Olivia, Scartezzini Jean-Louis and Schueler Andreas (Dirs.). Coatings with tailored electronic and optical properties for advanced glazing. EPFL Thesis n° 9199 (2019)

A. G. Kostro, J.-L. Scartezzini and A. Schueler (Dirs.). Microstructured glazing for daylighting, glare protection, seasonal thermal control and clear view. EPFL PhD thesis, n° 6465 (2015)

A. Paone, J.-L. Scartezzini and A. Schueler (Dirs.). Switchable Selective Absorber Coatings for Overheating Protection of Solar Thermal Collectors. EPFL PhD thesis, n° 5878 (2013)

M. Joly, J.-L. Scartezzini and A. Schueler (Dirs.). Développement et optimisation de revêtements minces nanostructurés pour capteurs solaires thermiques et modules photovoltaïques. EPFL PhD thesis, n° 5541 (2012).

Awards

RailTech 2019 Innovation Award, Utrecht, to Andreas Schüler, Olivia Bouvard, Luc Burnier, Jérémy Fleury, for Energy efficient windows that transmit telephone signals.

Watt d’Or 2019 “Energy efficient mobility” by Swiss Federal Office of Energy, Andreas Schüler, Olivia Bouvard, Luc Burnier, Jérémy Fleury (as part of a team headed by BLS train company and Basel University), for Nina trains energy efficiency modernisation. Contribution: energy efficient windows transparent to phone signals.

Award winning publications

Jing Gong, André Kostro, Jean-Louis Scartezzini, Andreas Schüler, Feasibility study on a novel daylighting system with embedded micro compound parabolic concentrators (CPCs). Nonimaging Optics: Efficient Design for Illumination and Solar Concentration XV (Vol. 10758, p. 1075807). International Society for Optics and Photonics. Nonimaging optics best paper award – SPIE Optical Engineering & Applications, 2018, 19-20 August 2018, San Diego, CA, USA

Martin Joly, Yan Antonetti, Martin Python, Marina Gonzalez, Thomas Gascou, Jean-Louis Scartezzini, Andreas Schüler, Novel black selective coating for tubular solar absorbers based on a sol-gel method, Solar Energy Journal Best Paper Award 2012-2013

Peter Oelhafen, Andreas Schueler, Nanostructured materials for solar energy conversion, Solar Energy Journal Best Paper in Energy Conversion Award 2005/2006

Publications

Field Guide to Northern Tree-related Microhabitats: Descriptions and size limits for their inventory in boreal and hemiboreal forests of Europe and North America

R. Bütler Sauvain; L. Larrieu; L. F. Lunde; M. Maxence; B. Nordén et al.

Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research WSL, Switzerland, 2024.

Research topics

Patents

PhD Theses

Awards

Award winning publications

Publications

Field Guide to Northern Tree-related Microhabitats: Descriptions and size limits for their inventory in boreal and hemiboreal forests of Europe and North America

Comparison of Three Viral Nucleic Acid Preamplification Pipelines for Sewage Viral Metagenomics

Radio-Activities: Architecture and Broadcasting in Cold War Berlin

No Last One

All That is Solid

Quantifying the effects of rainfall temporal variability on landscape evolution processes

Towards a metabolic theory of catchments: scaling of water and carbon fluxes with size

Impact of CO2-rich seawater injection on the flow properties of basalts

TSLAM: a tag-based object-centered monocular navigation system for augmented manual woodworking.

Water weakening and the compressive brittle strength of carbonates: Influence of fracture toughness and static friction

Tree diversity reduces variability in sapling survival under drought

The angiogenic growth of cities

Can Gas Consumption Data Improve the Performance of Electricity Theft Detection?

The molecular scale mechanism of deposition ice nucleation on silver iodide

Microbial genome collection of aerobic granular sludge cultivated in sequencing batch reactors using different carbon source mixtures

The Extraordinary March 2022 East Antarctica “Heat” Wave. Part II: Impacts on the Antarctic Ice Sheet

The Extraordinary March 2022 East Antarctica “Heat” Wave. Part I: Observations and Meteorological Drivers

Implementation of the ISORROPIA-lite aerosol thermodynamics model into the EMAC chemistry climate model (based on MESSy v2.55): implications for aerosol composition and acidity

Land Cover Mapping From Multiple Complementary Experts Under Heavy Class Imbalance

Muon Collider Forum report

Impact of anthropogenic emission control in reducing future PM2.5 concentrations and the related oxidative potential across different regions of China

Machine Learning Security Against Data Poisoning: Are We There Yet?

Data-driven statistical optimization of a groundwater monitoring network

Comparison of selected surface level ERA5 variables against in‐situ observations in the continental Arctic

Settlement Layout Optimization: Appropriate Communal Open Space

Settlement Layout Optimization: Appropriate Communal Open Space – Annex 1: Public Services & Facilities (PSF)

Settlement Layout Optimization: Appropriate Communal Open Space – Annex 2: Efficient Circulation Network (CN)

3D Geomechanical Modelling of CO2 Storage with Focus on Fault Stability

3D Geomechanical Modelling of CO2 Storage with Focus on Fault Stability

Shear and steel-fibre reinforcement for the punching resistance of flat slabs at internal and edge columns

Influence of model uncertainty and long term deformations in action effects calculation in reinforced concrete structures

Rock Anisotropy Promotes Hydraulic Fracture Containment at Depth

FLO:RE – A new floor system made of reused reinforced concrete and steel elements

MaskCLR: Attention-Guided Contrastive Learning for Robust Action Representation Learning

Social-Transmotion: Promptable Human Trajectory Prediction

Modeling Mode-Dependent Lane Discipline in Hybrid Traffic

When Your AI Becomes a Target: AI Security Incidents and Best Practices

TTool: A Supervised Artificial Intelligence-Assisted Visual Pose Detector for Tool Heads in Augmented Reality Woodworking

Toward Reliable Human Pose Forecasting With Uncertainty

Warum Unternehmen radikal umdenken müssen

La realité augmenté au service de l’usinage de charpente

A concrete answer for circular construction: three prototypes reusing saw-cut elements

Lumped Drag Model Identification and Real-Time External Force Detection for Rotary-Wing Micro Aerial Vehicles

Numerical investigation of two-dimensional Mode-II delamination in composite laminates

Minkowski Distance Based Pilot Protection for Tie Lines Between Offshore Wind Farms and MMC

Twenty years of irrigation acclimation is driven by denser canopies and not by plasticity in twig- and needle-level hydraulics in a Pinus sylvestris forest

Scalable semantic 3D mapping of coral reefs with deep learning

Spatio-temporal patterns and drivers of CH4 and CO2 fluxes from rivers and lakes in highly urbanized areas

Gene expression of Pocillopora damicornis coral larvae in response to acidification and ocean warming

Invasive palms have more efficient and prolonged CO2 assimilation compared to native sub-Mediterranean vegetation

The Strong Integral Input-to-State Stability Property in Dynamical Flow Networks

Insights from an extensive triaxial testing campaign on a shale for comparative site characterization of a deep geological repository

Global emergent responses of stream microbial metabolism to glacier shrinkage

Effects of Hyporheic Exchange and Settlement on the Particle Size Distribution of Colloids

What is NExT? A new conceptual model for comfort, satisfaction, health, and well-being in buildings

Fault roughness controls injection-induced seismicity

Reducing Annotation Efforts in Electricity Theft Detection Through Optimal Sample Selection

The microbial genomics of glacier-fed streams: adaptations to an extreme ecosystem

Migration distance from birthplace and its association with relative income and employment share among heterosexual couples in Switzerland

Transitions: que faire de la mobilité dans l’architecture?

Embodied Carbon Premium for Cantilevers

An image convolution-based method for the irregular stone packing problem in masonry wall construction

« La plus vieille usine du monde ». Socio-histoire de l’incinérateur du Vallon (1958-2005)

Turbulence in the Strongly Heterogeneous Near-Surface Boundary Layer over Patchy Snow

Atmospheric isoprene measurements reveal larger-than-expected Southern Ocean emissions

Understanding snow saltation parameterizations: lessons from theory, experiments and numerical simulations

Influence of sun cups on surface albedo of wet Alpine snowpack

The Environment, constant or variable?

Pentavalent U reactivity impacts U isotopic fractionation during reduction by magnetite

Microbial hydrogen sinks in the sand-bentonite backfill material for the deep geological disposal of radioactive waste

Analyses des flux de carbone du secteur Praille-Acacias-Vernets (PAV) à Genève

Enjeux et potentialités du concept de quartier post-carbone

The Past’s Traces in the Future of Museums

The impacts of decarbonization pathways on Sustainable Development Goals in the European Union