Visit by Dr Paul Lane

17th February 2012

Dr Paul Lane from the Naval Research Laboratory, Washington has visited the OSC. Dr Lane is well known for his research relating to organic solar cells and gave an overview of rapid recent progress in the field in a colloquium, followed by a research talk on his Physical Review Letter, which was published today.

Explosive Sensing Interviews

13th December 2011

Ifor Samuel has been interviewed by AIP Advances about our work on explosive sensing which has recently been published by the journal. A podcast of the full interview is available from the AIP Advances Feature Page. Graham Turnbull was also interviewed about the work and his comments appear in this month's Laser Focus World.

SPIE Lecture

2nd November 2011

Ifor Samuel delivered a plenary lecture at SPIE 2011 Optics + Photonics Solar and OLEDs in San Diego in August entitled "Emerging Applications of Organic Optoelectronics". In the talk two aspects of our work were covered - organic lasers for explosive detection and the use of OLEDs in the treatment of skin cancer. The lecture is available to watch on the SPIE website.

Rank Prize Win

20th September 2011

Yue Wang recently attended the Rank Prize symposium on optoelectronics. Presenting her recent results on organic lasers and their use as explosive sensors, Yue's excellent work was recognised with the awarding of the best abstract and presentation prize in the young scientist category. Congratulations to Yue.

Explosive Detection Work Highlighted

19th August 2011

Our work on explosive sensing has again attracted the attention of news organisations. Our recently published paper in AIP Advances, entitled "Ultra-portable explosives sensor based on a CMOS florescence lifetime analysis micro-system" has been promoted by AIP as a news highlight. The work has subsequently been featured on ScienceDaily amongst other news websites. The paper describes methods to detect trace explosive vapours by measuring the light emitted from a polymer with a compact piece of portable equipment.

Organic Semiconductor Centre Welcomes Leading Solar Cell Researchers

28th March 2011

The Organic Semiconductor Centre is this week involved in the SU2P Symposium that is being organised here in St Andrews. A collaboration between leading Scottish and US institutions, SU2P helps to deliver a disruptive new approach to business engagement and photonics research. A full session has been organised on photovoltaic research and applications, chaired by Prof. Samuel.

New International Energy Collaborations

18th March 2011

The OSC is beginning two new international collaborations in the field of organic solar cells. In the first we will team up with Dr Graeme Cooke at the University of Glasgow and Prof. Vince Rotello at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, investigating novel chemical systems for organic solar cells. In the second we will work with Prof. Joachim Loos at the University of Glasgow and Prof. Xiaoniu Yang of the Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry (CIAC) at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and will investigate the ageing behaviour of organic solar cells.

National Science Week

13th March 2011

On Saturday the OSC, as part of an active series of public outreach activities, took part in the Science Discovery Day in the Physics department here in St Andrews. Forming a major component of the Fife Science Festival this event attracted over 500 visitors, ranging from under 8 months to over 80 years, who came to the physics department to partake in a series of hands-on science experiments and activities. We hosted a hugely popular workshop on making Dye Sensitized Gratzel solar cells using tea and turmeric as the active medium. In addition we ran a series of hands-on demonstrations on organic fluorescence, OLED devices and optical illusions. By the end of the day future scientists between the ages of 5 and 15 had put together dozens of solar cells and a non-stop stream of enthusiastic visitors had experienced directly the type of research carried out by our group and had new knowledge of the benefits and advantages of a range of cutting edge organic optoelectronic technologies.

Paper Makes Top 20 List

23rd February 2011

One of our papers, "Effect of metal cathode reflectance on the exciton-dissociation efficiency in heterojunction organic solar cells", has made the top 20 download list for 2010 in Applied Physics Letters. This work (doi:10.1063/1.3098472) is also available as a pdf here on our group website.

Further items from past years can be found in the news archive:

2010 • 2009 • 2008 • 2007 • 2006 • 2005 • 2004 • 2003 • 2002 • 2001

Below are a selection of highlights from the past few years:

Explosive Detection Work Receives Further Coverage

9th June 2010

After being featured in New Scientist the work in the OSC on using organic lasers to detect explosives has received further attention. The story has been featured by numerous news organisations around the world, including BBC News, Times Online, Die Welt, The Scotsman, The Daily Mail and the Daily Record, amongst others.

The research focuses on using organic lasers to sense very small quantities of explosive vapours and it is envisaged that this could be used in both battlefield situations and also in domestic environments such as airports. The university press release as well as the paper itself are available to read.

Skin cancer Treatment Launched and Highlighted on Sky, BBC and CBS News

12th March 2010

A wearable light source capable of treating common skin cancers has been launched today at the 2010 meeting of the European Society for Photodynamic Therapy. This breakthrough in skin cancer treatment was developed by Prof. Ifor Samuel and Prof. James Ferguson at Ninewells Hospital, Dundee. The idea started from Ifor's research on organic semiconductors as new light-emitting materials, enabling the light-emitting "sticking plaster" to be made. The new treatment could ultimately be given by general practitioners, removing the need for a hospital visit. More can be read on the Sky News, BBC News, and CBS News.

Nature Photonics Paper Published

1st October 2009

The Nature Photonics article discussing how to recognise a laser is published. More publications can be found here.

Organic Semiconductor Centre Wins Printed Electronics Award

4th December 2008

The Organic Semiconductor Centre has been awarded the Printed Electronics Academic R&D award for its innovative work, which includes advances in lasers, semiconductors and the treatment of cancer. Prof. Ifor Samuel collected the award at the ceremony held in San Jose, California. Read the press release

Prof. Samuel Wins Ben Sturgeon Award

15th September 2008

The Society for Information Display has awarded Prof. Ifor Samuel with their Ben Sturgeon Award in recognition of research achievements in the displays area. Prof Samuel and his team have been developing the use of electrically conducting polymers (plastics) that emit light, and which can be used in flexible displays. Read the press release

LED-pumped Polymer Laser Developed

6th May 2008

Ying Yang, a research student working with Dr Graham Turnbull and Professor Ifor Samuel has recently demonstrated an LED-pumped polymer laser. This development opens the way for a new generation of low cost tunable visible lasers. The work has been highlighted in a News and Views piece in Nature [1] and by optics.org and will be presented by Miss Yang in a talk at the prestigious International Conference on the Science and Technology of Synthetic Metals in Brazil in July. The published paper, was one of the top twenty downloaded articles on Applied Physics Letters.

• Read the press release
• View the Research Highlight
• Read the paper
• Find out more about our work on organic lasers