Organic Semiconductors & Nanostructures
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Welcome to the website of the UCL Organic Semiconductors group!
Here you will find information about us, our current and past work, the facilities available to the group and details of vacancies and available PhD projects if you’re interested in joining us. We also have information on accommodation in London for new, prospective and visiting students and staff, and links to external webpages relevant to our work. Click on the links above to go to the relevant pages. Recent news related to the group is given below.
If you want to get in touch, head to our contacts page.
Group photo. September 2016. Standing from left to right: Leonardo Badurina, Bradley Douglas, Alessandro Minotto, Luca Santarelli, Tecla Arcidiacono, Franco Cacialli, Andrea Zampetti, Giuseppe Carnicella, Giovanni F. Cotella, Alexandros G. Rapidis.
News
Paper with media coverage!! (04 Mar 2021)
Our paper in collaboration with Virgilio Mattoli and collaborators at IIT reporting world-first Ultrathin, Ultra-Conformable, and Free-Standing Tattooable Organic Light-Emitting Diodes has been published recently in Advanced Electronic Materials.
- J. Barsotti, A.G. Rapidis, F. Greco, F. Cacialli, V. Mattoli. Ultrathin, ultra-conformable and free-standing tattoo-able organic light-emitting diodes Adv. Electron. Mater. 21, 2001145
LinkImage credit J. Barsotti - IIT
In this work, we demonstrated a novel tattooable, ultrathin, green organic light-emitting diode (OLED) fabricated on top of commercial temporary tattoo paper, whose transfer mechanism relies on dissolution of the sacrificial layer typically incorporated in paper-tattoos. The ready-to-use device can be stored on the tattoo substrate and released on the target surface at a later time, simply by a slight wetting of the tattoo paper with water. Given that this approach provides a quick and easy method of transferring OLEDs on virtually any surface we consider it particularly appealing, in perspective, for on-skin and disposable electronic applications. Although at a proof of concept level, this work demonstrates, for the very first time, the feasibility of ultrathin operational OLED tattoos. Such results show the potential for an OLED tattoo technology in integrated conformable electronic circuits for a wide plethora or potential applications.
We are delighted by the intense media attention being paid to this work:
Mail Online, Independent, Daily Star, Engineer (UK), Semana (Colombia), Tecmundo (Brazil), IGN (US), Futurism (US), Digital Trends (US), Yahoo News (France), Sina (China). UCL News, https://www.london-nano.com/news-events/light-emitting-tattoo-engineered-first-time
Papers (04 Nov 2020)
Our paper reporting efficient (up to 3.8 % EQE) NIR OLEDs, as well as a novel quantitative model of the internal quantum efficiency for active layers supporting triplets-to-singlets conversion. has been provisionally accepted for publication in Light: Science & Applications. These results were obtained in collaboration with colleagues at Oxford, Pavia, and Bologna (CNR-ISMN) and provide a general strategy for designing high-luminance NIR emitters.
- A. Minotto, I. Bulut, A.G. Rapidis, G. Carnicella, M. Patrini, E. Lunedei, H.L. Anderson, F. Cacialli. ”Towards efficient near-infrared fluorescent organic light-emitting diodes”. Light.: Sci. Appl. 10, 18 (2021)
Efficient Far-Red/NIR OLEDs for VLCs, but incorporating different emitters had also been reported in LSA earlier on in the year.
- Visible Light Communications with Efficient Far-Red/Near-infrared Solution-Processed Organic Light-emitting Diodes”.
PhD Viva (16 October 2020)
Congratulations to Tecla Arcidiacono for successfully passing her PhD viva.
New Member (1 May 2020)
We are delighted to welcome Dr Marcello Righetto as a new post-doctoral research fellow in the group, funded by the Centre of Advanced Materials for Integrated Energy Systems (CAM-IES) collaboration.
New Member (15 January 2020)
We are delighted to welcome Adil Patel as a new PhD student.
PhD Viva (6 December 2019)
Congratulations to Giovanni Cotella for successfully passing his PhD viva.
PhD Viva (3 December 2019)
Congratulations to Giuseppe Carnicella for successfully passing his PhD viva.
New Member (1 October 2019)
We are delighted to welcome Xiaona Guan as a new PhD student.
PhD Viva (9 September 2019)
Congratulations to Dr. Alexandros Rapidis for successfully passing his PhD viva.
Prize (25 July 2019)
Congratulations to Ioannis Ierides for winning a prestigious IET postgraduate prize.
Papers (6 Feb 2019)
Two new review papers authored by members of the group have been published in recent months:
- “The resurgence of organic photovoltaics”
- “Near‐Infrared (NIR) Organic Light‐Emitting Diodes (OLEDs): Challenges and Opportunities”
Paper (15 Jul 2018)
Dr. Alessandro Minotto, Dr. Andrea Zampetti and Giuseppe Carnicella, alongside with collaborators from Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden), Addis Ababa University (Ethiopia) and Flinders University (Australia), have demonstrated unprecedented efficiencies from NIR OLEDs based on a purely organic fluorescent active layer emitting above 800 nm, publishing their outstanding results in a recent paper in Advanced Materials. This breakthrough has been featured in the Research Highlights section of London Centre for Nanotechnology website and in the OSA Direct newsletter (Vol. 16 Issue 21).
PhD Viva (17 Nov. 2017)
Congratulations to Luca Santarelli for successfully passing his PhD viva.
Paper (18 May 2017)
A breakthrough has been achieved by Dr. Andrea Zampetti and Dr. Alessandro Minotto, researchers from the Marie Curie initial training network ITN Organic Semiconductors for NIR Optoelectronics (OSNIRO), alongside collaborators from Advent Technologies in Greece and from the University of Wuppertal (Germany). The paper “Highly Efficient Solid-State Near-Infrared Organic Light-Emitting Diodes incorporating A-D-A Dyes based on α,β-unsubstituted “BODIPY” Moieties” shows record external quantum efficiencies for diodes based on organic red/NIR oligomers free from heavy/toxic metals and combining electron-withdrawing (A) moieties together with electron-donating (D) ones in a previously poorly studied “A-D-A” motif. This paper features in the Research Highlights section of London Centre for Nanotechnology website.
Paper (24 Jan. 2017)
The paper “Neutron Radiation Tolerance of Two Thiophene-Based Conjugated Polymers: the Importance of Cristallinity for Organic Avionics” by Giuseppe M. Paternò has been published in Scientific Reports and features in the Research Highlights section of London Centre for Nanotechnology website.
PhD Viva (6 Dec. 2016)
Congratulations to Valentina Robbiano and Giuseppe Maria Paternò for successfully passing their PhD vivas.
Papers (27 Nov. 2016)
Several new papers authored or co-authored by members of the group have been published in recent months. These include the following journal papers:
- “Neutron Polarisation Analysis of Polymer:Fullerene Blends for Organic Photovoltaic”
- “Tuning fullerene intercalation in poly(thiophene) derivative by controlling the polymer degree of self-organization”
- “Control of interchain aggregation of luminescent conjugated polyelectrolytes in water-propanol co-solvent mixtures”
- “Ultrasound-induced liquid-phase exfoliation of graphite into size-controlled graphene: from nanosheets to nanodots”
- “Neutron Radiation Tolerance of Two Thiophene-Based Conjugated Polymers: the Importance of Cristallinity for Organic Avionics”
PhD Viva (1 Nov. 2016)
Congratulations to Ludovica Intilla for successfully passing her PhD viva.
Paper (23 Mar. 2016)
The paper “Luminescent neutral Cu(I) Complexes: synthesis, characterization and application in solution-processed OLED”, co-authored by Franco Cacialli, has been accepted for publication by the ECS Journal of Solid State Science and Technology.
Papers (17 Mar. 2016)
Several new papers authored or co-authored by members of the group have been published in recent months. These include the following articles in conference proceedings:
-“Synergic Integration of Conjugated Luminescent Polymers and Three-Dimensional Silicon Microstructures for the Effective Synthesis of Photoluminescent Light Source Arrays”
-“Low-Gap Polymers Incorporating a Dicarboxylic Imide Moiety for Near-Infrared Polymer Light-Emitting Diodes”
-“Electrostatic discharge sensitivity investigation on organic field-effect thin film transistors”
-“Investigation Of The Bragg-Snell Law In Photonic Crystals”
-“The Resilience of Poly(3-hexylthiophene-2,5-diyl) (P3HT) Field-Effect Transistors (FETs) with respect to Electrostatic Discharge (ESD) Effects” by Luca Santarelli, Giuseppe Paternò, Franco Cacialli and others
and the following journal papers:
-“Experimental and Computational Study on the Temperature Behavior of CNT Networks”
-“Synthesis and Photophysical Characteristics of Polyfluorene Polyrotaxanes”
-“Highly Red-Shifted NIR Emission from a Novel Anthracene Conjugated Polymer Backbone Containing Pt(II) Porphyrins”
-“Traceable atomic force microscopy of high-quality, solvent-free crystals of [6,6]-phenyl-C61-butyric acid methyl ester (PCBM)”
New Member (16 Dec. 2015)
We are delighted to welcome Alexandros Rapidis as a new Early Stage Researcher in the SYNCHRONICS project.
Editorial Board Appointment (7 Dec. 2015)
Professor Franco Cacialli has joined the International Editorial Advisory Board of Advanced Materials Technologies (AMT), soon to be launched by Wiley. AMT will be an outlet for top-quality work on the advanced engineering and device design aspects of materials systems for application in areas such as energy, healthcare, electronics, optics, microfluidics, sensors, food safety, water, and environmental technologies. AMT will place emphasis on device design, integration, and function.
International School on Advanced Optical Materials and Devices (27 Nov. 2015)
The SYNCHRONICS network is organizing an International School on Advanced Optical Materials and Devices which will take place in London from March 1st-3rd 2016. Please follow the link for more details.
Paper (9 Sep. 2015)
The paper “Inorganic caesium lead iodide perovskite solar cells”, whose authors include Giuseppe Paternò, Andrea Zampetti and Franco Cacialli, has been published online by the Journal of Materials Chemistry A.
New Members (23 Sep. 2015)
We are delighted to welcome Giovanni Francesco Cotella as a new Early Stage Researcher in the iSwitch project.
New Members (8 Sep. 2015)
We are delighted to welcome three new Early Stage Researchers to the group: Giulia Lucarelli and Francesco Silvestri to work on the OSNIRO project and Tecla Arcidiacono to work on the SYNCHRONICS project.
New Members (8 Jul. 2015)
We are delighted to welcome Giuseppe Carnicella as a new Early Stage Researcher in the SYNCHRONICS project.
Poster Prize (04 Jun. 2015)
Giuseppe Paternò has been awarded the poster prize at the 2015 UK Neutron and Muon Users Meeting, held at Hinckley Island Hotel in Leicestershire on 19-21 May.
Paper (5 May 2015)
Giulia Tregnago’s paper “Low-temperature fluorescence of solvent-free PCBM single-crystals” has been accepted by the Journal of Physical Chemistry C.
Paper (17 Mar. 2015)
The paper “Wavelength-Multiplexed Polymer Light-Emitting Diodes: towards 55 Mb/s Organic Visible Light Communications”, whose authors include Francesco Bausi and Franco Cacialli, has been accepted by the IEEE Journal of Selected Areas in Communications.
PhD Viva (13 Mar. 2015)
Congratulations to Giulia Tregnago on passing her PhD viva.
Vacancies (12 Mar. 2015)
Three vacancies for Early Stage Researchers in the SYNCHRONICS project are now being advertised. The closing date for applications is March 24th; full details in this document.
Award (12 Mar. 2015)
Professor Franco Cacialli has been awarded a Wolfson Research Merit Award by the Royal Society. More details here.
Book chapter (06 Mar. 2015)
Chapter 15, “Hybrid-organic photonic structures for light emission modification”, in the forthcoming “Organic and Hybrid Photonic Crystals”, to be published by Springer in June, has been authored by Francesco di Stasio, Valentina Robbiano and Franco Cacialli.
Paper (27 Feb. 2015)
Giulia Tregnago’s paper “Thia- and selena-diazole containing polymers for near-infrared light-emitting diodes” has been published online by the Journal of Materials Chemistry C.
Paper (05 Feb. 2015)
Penglei Li’s paper “Luminescent Properties of a Water-Soluble Conjugated Polymer Incorporating Graphene-Oxide Quantum Dots” has been published online by ChemPhysChem.
Paper (22 Jan. 2015)
Francesco Bausi’s paper “Thermal treatment and chemical doping of semi-transparent graphene films” has been published by Organic Electronics.
Paper (08 Dec. 2014)
The paper “Analysis of Sprayed Carbon Nanotube Films on Rigid and Flexible Substrates” co-authored by Valentina Robbiano and Luca Santarelli has been published in the Proceedings of the 14th IEEE International Conference on Nanotechnology.
PhD Viva (23 Oct. 2014)
Congratulations to Nico Seidler on passing his PhD viva.
Paper (10 Oct. 2014)
Giulia Tregnago’s paper “Virtually pure near-infrared electro- luminescence from exciplexes at polyfluorene/hexaazatrinaphthylene interfaces” has been published by Applied Physics Letters.
New Projects (15 Sep. 2014)
We are delighted to announce that our proposal for an MSC action titled “SupramolecularlY eNgineered arCHitectures for optoelectRonics and photONICS: a multi-site initial training action (SYNCHRONICS)” has been evaluated positively (95.4% score) and we have now been invited to negotiation and grant agreement preparation as coordinators. We expect to be able to hire three new early-stage-researchers to start after 1/1/2015.
New Projects (15 Sep. 2014)
We are also pleased to announce that our proposal for an MSC action titled “Integrated self-assembled SWITCHable systems and materials (iSwitch)” (coordinated by P Samorí at Strasbourg) has also been invited to negotiation. We expect to be able to hire one new early-stage-researcher to start after 1/1/2015 within this project.
New Member (17 Jul. 2014)
We are delighted to welcome Professor Mariagrazia Graziano from the “Politecnico di Torino”, who will be joining our group for 2 years from 1st October 2014 as a Marie-Curie Senior Intra-European Fellow (MC-IEF) to work on a project on molecular quantum dot cellular automata.
New Member (17 Jul. 2014)
We are delighted to welcome Professor Tiziana Fiore from the University of Palermo, who will spend her sabbatical year in our group, starting on the 1st of October 2014.
New Member (7 Jul. 2014)
We are delighted to welcome Shimpei Goto, who joins us from the Japan Patent Office to spend 1 year in the group.
2014 Young Researcher Award (7 Jul. 2014)
Congratulations to Francesco di Stasio for winning the 2014 Young Researcher Award (Physical Sciences and Engineering section) jointly awarded by the Association of Italian Scientists in the UK (AIS-UK) and the Italian Embassy in London.
Poster Prize (28 Apr. 2014)
Giuseppe Paternò has been awarded the poster prize at the 2014 UK Neutron and Muon Users Meeting, held in Warwick on 10-11 April.
Editor (09 Jan. 2014)
Professor Franco Cacialli has joined the Editorial Board of Nanomaterials and Nanotechnology, an Open Access journal published by INTECH.
Plenary Speaker (07 Nov. 2013)
Professor Franco Cacialli will be giving the plenary lecture at the Italian Crystal Growth 2013 conference in Parma at 10.00 a.m. on Thursday 14th November, entitled “The power of intermolecular interactions in organic semiconductors: from threaded molecular wires to PCBM single crystals”.
Paper (24 Oct. 2013)
Francesco di Stasio’s paper “Fluorescent polystyrene photonic crystals self-assembled with water-soluble conjugated polyrotaxanes” has been published online by Applied Physics Letters Materials.
Paper (09 Oct. 2013)
Nico Seidler’s paper “Enhanced crystallinity and film retention of P3HT thin-films for efficient organic solar cells by use of preformed nanofibers in solution” has been published online by the Journal of Materials Chemistry C.
Poster Prize (09 Sep. 2013)
Congratulations to Valentina Robbiano, who won the prize for the best poster presentation in the Science and Engineering of Molecular Electronic Materials at the 12th European Conference on Molecular Electronics.
Paper (06 Sep. 2013)
Oliver Fenwick’s paper “Efficient red electroluminescence from diketopyrrolopyrrole copolymerised with a polyfluorene” has been published online by Applied Physics Letters Materials.
Cover Image (30 Aug. 2013)
Giuseppe Paternò’s recent paper published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry C has been selected for the inside cover page of the September 28 issue.
New PhD Student (28 Aug. 2013)
Luca Santarelli has joined the group.
New Postdoc (03 Jul. 2013)
Dr. Keith Fraser has joined the group.
Paper (03 Jul. 2013)
Giuseppe Paternò’s paper “Micro-focused X-Ray Diffraction Characterization of High-quality [6,6]-Phenyl C61 Butyric acid Methyl Ester Single Crystals Without Solvent Impurities” has been published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry C.
PhD Viva (05 Feb. 2013)
Congratulations to Marten Tolk for successfully passing his viva.
PhD Viva (10 Dec. 2012)
Congratulations to Charlotte Fléchon for successfully passing her viva.
Marshall Stoneham Prize 2012 (Nov. 2012)
Congratulations to our former group member Francesco di Stasio for winning the Marshall Stoneham Prize for Outstanding Postgraduate Research Physics for a PhD thesis in the area of Condensed Matter Physics titled “Supramolecular architectures: Properties and applications”. Francesco has now moved to Cambridge Display Technology where he works to improve the lifetime of fluorescent and phosphorescent polymeric light emitting diodes and aid the development of new materials, deposition methods and device structures with better performance.
PhD Viva (07 Sep. 2012)
Congratulations to Penglei Li for successfully passing his viva.
The 2012 Superior Summer School
The “Nanoscale Engineering and Fabrication of (Opto)Electronic Devices” summer school will focus on the nanofabrication, engineering and characterisation of nanoelectronic materials and interfaces. UCL, September 12-14 2012.
PhD Viva (21 May 2012)
Congratulations to Francesco di Stasio and Yong Sig Shin for successfully passing their vivas.