Assaf Manor's Homepage
About
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Future
Post-doctoral fellow, OCM group, Uni. Michigan.
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Present
Ph. D., Nanotechnology,
Excitonics laboratory, Technion, Israel
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Past
M. Sc., Solar energy Physics, Ben-Gurion University, Israel
B.Sc. Electrical Engineering, Technion, Israel
B.Sc. Physics, Technion, Isreal
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Links:
Contact me by email
Research Interests
My main interest is the science of light-matter interaction in the context of photovoltaic energy conversion. I am currently finishing my Ph. D. in the Technion (Israel Institute of Technology) and continuing to postoctoral research in Uni. Michigan. Here are some of my projects:
Thermally Enhanced PL converter (TEPL)
In PV power generation, heat is always wasted. We have found a new way to utilize it and enhancing PV efficiency by the thermal up-conversion of "cold" photons.
Temperture effect on photoluminescence
Photoluminescence (PL) is a fundamental light-matter phonomenon. A photon excites an atom or a molecule to a high-energy state which then relaxes by emitting a different photon. Usaully, PL is a dissipative mechanism where the emitted photon is of lower energy than the absorbed one, and the energy difference is lost to heat. Here, we have investigated the oposite direction where thermal energy is absorbed by the excited state, which results in the emission of higher energy photon.
(a) Experimental setup (b) Nd3+ sample PL spectrum temperature dependence (c) Integrated photon rate temperature dependence (d) Comparison of the energetic photon rate between PL and thermal emissions
Enhanced IR to NIR upconversion
Efficient up conversion of low energy to higher energy photons is a desireable feature in many fields, including solar enrgy conversion. However, this process efficiency is usually very low. In this paper, we have investigated enhanced up conversion of IR light (10.6 micron) to 1 micron NIR, ten-fold in energy.
Organic photovoltaics size effects
Up-scaling of the laboratory small-scale cells isn't a trivial process. Here, we have found that significant efficiency dercrease takes place even when mm size cells are enlareged to cm size. We also used concentrated sunlight in order to locally probe small areas of large area cells and find the efficiency bottleneck.
Organic photovoltaics degradation
Organic photovoltaics suffer from different degradation mechanisms which hamper their performance in the long term. Here, we have used concentrated sunlight in order to accelerate degradation process and find reversible ones.
Organic photovoltaics Fundamentals
In addition to experimental studying, I have also been interested in OPV thermodynamics and the behavior of the open-circuit voltage. In this paper, we have analyzed the effects of disorder on OPV voltage.
Publications
1. Manor, A., Kruger, N., Sabaphati, S. & & Rotschild, C., Thermally-Enhanced Photoluminescence for Heat Harvesting in Photovoltaics, Nature Communications, Accepted (2016).
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2. Boriskina, S. V. et al. Roadmap on optical energy conversion. J. Opt. 18, 73004 (2016).
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3. Granot, D., Kruger, N., Manor, A. & Rotschild, C. Efficient 10-Fold Upconversion through Steady-State Non-Thermal-
Equilibrium Excitation. ACS Photonics 3, 174–178 (2016).
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4. Manor, A., Martin, L. & Rotschild, C. Conservation of photon rate in endothermic photoluminescence and its transition
to thermal emission. Optica 2, 585 (2015).
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5. Søndergaard, R. R. et al. The use of polyurethane as encapsulating method for polymer solar cells—An inter
laboratory study on outdoor stability in 8 countries. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 99, 292–300 (2012).
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6. Manor, A., Katz, E. A., Tromholt, T. & Krebs, F. C. Enhancing functionality of ZnO hole blocking layer in organic
photovoltaics. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 98, 491–493 (2012).
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7. Manor, A. & Katz, E. A. Open-circuit voltage of organic photovoltaics: Implications of the generalized Einstein relation
for disordered semiconductors. Sol. Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 97, 132–138 (2012).
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8. Manor, A., Katz, E. A., Andriessen, R. & Galagan, Y. Study of organic photovoltaics by localized concentrated sunlight:
Towards optimization of charge collection in large-area solar cells. Appl. Phys. Lett. 99, 173305 (2011).
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9. Manor, A., Katz, E. A., Tromholt, T. & Krebs, F. C. Electrical and Photo-Induced Degradation of ZnO Layers in Organic
Photovoltaics. Adv. Energy Mater. 1, 836–843 (2011).
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10. Gevorgyan, S. A. et al. An inter-laboratory stability study of roll-to-roll coated flexible polymer solar modules. Sol.
Energy Mater. Sol. Cells 95, 1398–1416 (2011).
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11. Tromholt, T., Manor, A., Katz, E. A. & Krebs, F. C. Reversible degradation of inverted organic solar cells by
concentrated sunlight. Nanotechnology 22, 225401 (2011).
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12. Manor, A., Katz, E. A., Tromholt, T., Hirsch, B. & Krebs, F. C. Origin of size effect on efficiency of organic photovoltaics.
J. Appl. Phys. 109, 74508 (2011).