wire - news in brief

All-perovskite tandem solar cells could soon pick up where silicon solar cells reach their limits. These highly efficient, lightweight and flexible cells have already proven themselves in the laboratory - now, researchers are working on scaling them up and making them ready for the real world. Roof tiles are becoming a thing of the past: Today, more and more Swiss roofs boast large black and blue rectangles that convert sunlight into electricity.

The electrification of many areas of life is leading to an increased demand for high-performance batteries.

The word "perovskite" describes a naturally occurring mineral, but also a whole range of highly specialized synthetic compounds that have promising applications in electronics and photovoltaics. But what do they actually have in common? Who discovered them? And how are researchers using them to create innovative technology? This is the focus of the new issue of Empa Quarterly.

In October 2023, Nathalie Casas took over the lead of Empa's Energy, Mobility and Environment research department.

Skin injuries caused by prolonged pressure often occur in people who are unable to change their position independently - such as sick newborns in hospitals or elderly people.

Researchers have extracted nanocellulose from a waste product of beer brewing and processed it into an aerogel.

The largest EU research initiative ever launched has come to a successful end: The Graphene Flagship was officially concluded at the end of last year.

A team from the University of Geneva is developing new alloys with bactericidal properties to combat antibiotic-resistant germs. While crucial to biotechnology, bacteria can also cause severe disease, exacerbated by their increasing resistance to antibiotics. This duality between economic benefits and infectious risks underlines the importance of finding ways to control their development.

Two outstanding publications by young researchers were honored with the Empa Research Award. The recipients, Amogh Kinikar and Shih-Chi Yang, wrote their award-winning papers during their doctoral studies at Empa.

In late November, researchers from Switzerland and abroad convened at Empa with experts from the pharmaceutical company CSL Vifor for a joint workshop on nanomedicines.

Eight stakeholders from business, science and the public sector launched the first project for wireless charging of electric vehicles in Switzerland at the end of November 2023.

Yaroslav Romanyuk has been working at Empa for around 15 years on complex thin-film technologies for solar cells, printed circuits, novel solid-state batteries and other applications.

A doctoral researcher studying architecture at ETH Zurich is using 3D printing to produce lightweight insulation building components from cement-free mineral foams derived from recycled industrial waste. These could cut heating and cooling costs for buildings, and encourage more efficient use of construction materials.

LISA: Innosuisse funding for battery research Empa will collaborate with Battery Consult AG, a research and development company specializing in salt battery technology, and the Swiss Innovation Park

Non-toxic and scalable water-based flow batteries would be a good solution for storing renewable energy in urban areas - if it weren't for their very low energy density.

The Empa research group led by Maksym Kovalenko is researching innovative materials for the batteries of tomorrow. Whether it's fast-charging electric cars or low-cost stationary storage, there's a promising material or a novel manufacturing process for every application. What are the hallmarks of a good battery? Is it its capacity? How fast it charges? Or its price? The answer depends on where the battery is used, says Empa researcher Kostiantyn Kravchyk.

Empa and Kyburz Switzerland AG are looking for ways to recycle end-of-life lithium-ion batteries in an efficient and resource-saving way. A specially developed experimental facility breaks down the old batteries into their components so that materials can be recovered as clean as possible. Everyone is familiar with this phenomenon from their cell phone or laptop: Over time, the capacity of the battery decreases, so that you have to reach for the charger more and more often.

Environmentally friendly, ubiquitously available and recyclable: Clay is a clean alternative among building materials. Empa researcher Ellina Bernard is trying to find out how the coveted material can actually be used to build in a sustainable and stable way. Her research project is being funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) with an Ambizione grant.

The Swiss Light Source SLS at PSI will shut down temporarily as part of a major upgrade project. It will come back online in 2025, ready to supply even more powerful synchrotron light than ever for innovative scientific experiments. At 8 a.m. on the morning of Saturday 30 September, the Swiss Light Source SLS, one of PSI's five large research facilities, will be shut down.

The new Technology Outlook of the Swiss Academy of Engineering Sciences (SATW) showcases the most important findings of numerous Swiss experts from science and industry for a prosperous future. In the areas of Energy and Environment, Manufacturing Processes and Materials as well as Life Sciences, eleven scientists contributed to the identification of the most important trends and their impact on technology and society.

3D printing can produce highly complex shapes. But printing ceramic objects with the help of a laser is a more difficult challenge. Now researchers at the Paul Scherrer Institute PSI have for the first time taken tomograms revealing what happens at microscopic level during this fabrication process. The findings will help improve this very promising technology.

Researchers want to accelerate the development of urgently needed new energy storage systems with the help of the Aurora battery robot.

Switzerland is built, at least as far as the road network is concerned. Therefore - and despite recycling - significantly more reclaimed asphalt is generated today than can be reused in new roads.

STUDENT PROJECT - Bénédicte Lunven just finished her bacherlor's degree and already has a foot in the sustainable economy door.

Switzerland hosts major events on the governance of mineral and metal resources Climate change discussions often overlook the central role played by the excessive extraction and use of natural resources.

Bruno Schuler and his young team are embarking on an ambitious research project: He will selectively generate defects in atomically-thin semiconductor layers and attempt to measure and control their quantum properties with simultaneous picosecond temporal resolu­tion and atomic precision. The resulting insights are expected to establish fundamental knowledge for future quantum computers.

This week, the photovoltaic sector will gather in Munich for Intersolar Europe, the world's leading exhibition for the solar industry. Solar plants in the Alps have the potential to deliver high output. The SLF analyses the threat they face from alpine hazards and helps to protect solar facilities. Photovoltaic systems at high altitudes on mountainsides could be a successful model thanks to the high light intensity, sloped surfaces and a light efficiency exceeding that of the lowlands.

Empa research helps Swiss watches to glow in the dark: The luminescent material Swiss Super-LumiNova, which was refined at Empa, now adorns the hands and dials of a number of wristwatches, including the MoonSwatch collection from Swatch and Omega.

The "Empa Zukunftsfonds" seeks private donors for outstanding research projects that are not (yet) supported elsewhere. For example a project from Empa's Surface Science and Coating Technologies laboratory: With the support of the Helmut Fischer and Anni Walther Foundation the researchers aim to accelerate the development of multifunctional thin films, which could be applied in electronic devices or high-performance optics.

We hope to lead you on a gripping journey through the world of research and innovation; you may be surprised at how broad the term "applied research" is defined at Empa.

More effective, reusable and self-repairing: a new kind of corrosion protection developed by the researchers Marco D'Elia, Walter Caseri, Mirko Magni und Markus Niederberger has been honoured with ETH Zurich's Spark Award 2023.

Two young scientists each receive an Empa Entrepreneur Fellowship to develop innovative products based on their research.

Europe's energy transition will not succeed without access to essential metals like rare earths, says security researcher Julian Kamasa.

Three institutes in the ETH Domain are conducting research on so-called perovskite-based optoelectronics, such as solar cells, photodetectors, and light-emitting diodes (LEDs). In a project called AMYS, labs of EPFL, ETH Zurich and Empa have now joined forces for four years to explore new chemical compositions, but also simple and scalable low cost production methods.

Electronic components are becoming smaller, more complex and more powerful - this calls for new solutions for joining them. An Empa team is developing nanostructured joining materials for the next generation of microelectronics and other demanding applications. Gordon Moore was right. In April 1965, the US engineer and later co-founder of Intel predicted that the number of transistors on a chip would double about every two years.

Researchers want to develop a novel type of insulating material from plant-based raw materials or waste products that can permanently bind the CO2 it contains by means of a special heat treatment - and thus act as a CO2 sink.