PV Gap

Dwayne Said:

organic solar cell market share and analysis?

We Answered:

my guess is you would have to invent that puppy.

Dora Said:

10 companies working on organic semiconductors?

We Answered:

You should take a tour of Arizona State's Flexible Display Center sometime.

Jessie Said:

Advice from fellow physicists!!!!?

We Answered:

I'm a chemist. I can not say for sure but I find it really really hard to believe that you will learn "every concept from physical chem next year in my physics classes". My question is WHO told you that?
My guess is they are either distorting the facts, ignorant or out right lying, but hey, ya never know. So you could ask a P-Chem prof for the facts. Or you could verify that the following are adequately covered
in your next year's physics text: entropy, enthalpy, free energy all of a chemical reaction, and of course of a phyical phase change - that, I'm sure will be in physics thermo courses. Gibbs free Energy? Raoult's Law? Mixing? Phase diagrams? Azeotropes? Distillation? Partial pressures? Statistical Mechanics? Surface Tension? Electrochemistry? After General Chem, ther are three valuable subjects in chemistry (to a physicist) analytical, physical and maybe organic. For me the best part of P-Chem (which was a bear) was the labs. Great equipment, great fun. I think anything you need to pick up from P-chem you will be able to w/o the course, but in many ways p-chem is the heart of what I do as an industrial chemist and as you realize will be important in a materials science career, too.
Get a PhD. Eyes on the prize. P-Chem is often the course (in the old days at least) that was used to weed out those who were weak in the analytical (math) department. can be a ball buster. I don't believe it will be a waste of your time. I do think somethings are better approached from the Physics and others are too "dirty" for physics to touch - and so its called P-Chem. As an undergraduate, my time was the limiting factor in these kinds of decisions...
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Lots of the previous authors comments seem to confuse QM with P-CHem. I would agree that unfortunately QM is too large a part of P-Chem AND that approaching it from the physics is just as good (if not better) Density Functional Theory - and all that - so if your p-chem is all QM and Statistical Mechanics and thermodynamics then I'd bail. But to the moron who thinks chemistry is a subdiscipline of physics my reply is that by that logic, so is politics. There is too much science out there for any of us to absorb in 4 or 8 years. We got to be judicious. See how much of the P-Chem book actually teaches the QM junk which you'll pick up (and probably better grasp) via physics. If thats all the course is, bail.

Gina Said:

Can the organic solar cells satisfy our thirst for Energy?

We Answered:

not for now, their efficiency is too low.
From the same surface you gain only 1/7 or 1/6 of the electricity gained from a common Si based photovoltaic panel.

We need to do much more research and develop better organic semiconductors.

However organic based semiconductors are really cheap if mass produced respect to the production of electronic grade Silica.
So yes, i'm looking forward in a near future to cover every roof, tent,house, car and every flat surface with organic solar panels.

Samuel Said:

Any time frame yet re: the availability and cost of "paint-on" organic solar cells?

We Answered:

Prototypes are being tested right now where an entire house is spray painted with these solar cells. They can provide energy for the home and two others.