Speakers

Padamshree Prof. A. K. Barua

Born on July 1, 1936 in Kolkata, Prof. Asok Kumar Barua was educated at Hare School, Presidency College (Phycics Hons) and Calcutta University (M.Sc. in Physics).He did Ph.D. degree in Physics under the guidance of Prof. B.N. Srivastava at the Indian Association for the Cultivation of Science(IACS).
After doing Post Doctoral work in USA he joined IACS in 1964 and became Professor in 1971. He served as its Director from December 1982 to 1989.
Since July, 2010 he is Hony. Emeritus Professor at Bengal Engineering and Science University, Shibpur, Howrah.

The most important contributions of Prof. Barua in the areas of Science and Technology relevant to the progress of India are

(1) the development along with his team at IACS is the complete indigenous technology from materials processing, fabrication of amorphous silicon (a-Si) solarcells/modules and basic production equipments and production technology

(2) Prof. Barua has also developed process for Radar Opaque Coating for use in Aircraft Canopy and Windshield . Equipment for applying this process to actual aircraft has been built at Hindustan Aeronautics Ltd, Bangalore

In all, Prof. Barua has published more than 300 original scientific papers in International Journals on different topics. 40 students have been awarded Ph.D. degree under his guidance

The works of Prof. Barua have received many recognitions some of which are given below;
(1) He was awarded Padma Shree in 2003 by Govt. of India
(2) The Materials Research Society of India has given him all awards including the distinguished     Materials Scientist of the Year Award in 2002.
(3) He has been elected as the Member of the Asia Pacific Academy of Materials and many more

Recently Prof. Barua has been appointed as Chairman of the R and D Committtee of the Ministry of New and Renewable Energy on solar photovoltaics under Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Energy Mission of Govt. of India. He is also in the Task Force of Department of Science and Technology on Solar Research Initiatives. He is a Member of the Research Council of National Solar Mission which is the highest body.

Biography

Bhushan Sopori is a Principal Engineer at the National Center for Photovoltaics, National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL). Prior to joining NREL in June 1987, he worked at Motorola Inc. for ten years and was Manager, Optoelectronic Analysis, at Solavolt International, a joint venture of Motorola Inc. and Shell Oil Co. He has extensive experience in solar cell and module fabrication. Dr Sopori is currently performing research in Defect Engineering for advanced device fabrication, development of instrumentation for material growth and device fabrication, and development of new processing techniques. He works with the photovoltaic industry partners, helping both large and small companies to improve their products and lower their costs. He managed the NREL/DOE Silicon Program for about 12 years and was Task Leader for Device Processing and Modeling. Dr. Sopori has published over 200 papers (in the areas of optics, holography, lasers, integrated optics, semiconductor devices, and crystal growth), written two book chapters, has 22 awarded patents, and developed several instruments and solar cell fabrication methods that have either been licensed or are being negotiated for license to industry for commercial production. He has received numerous awards including three prestigious R&D 100 awards.

Dr. Ajeet Rohatgi is a Regents' Professor and a Georgia Power Distinguished Professor in the School of Electrical Engineering at the Georgia Institute of Technology (Georgia Tech), where he joined the ECE faculty in 1985. He is highly regarded as one of the world's leading research scientists in photovoltaic (PV) technology, and is the founding director of the University Center of Excellence for Photovoltaic Research and Education (UCEP) at Georgia Tech. Dr. Rohatgi is also the Founder and CTO of Suniva®, Inc. and has positioned the company as a U.S. leader in the research, development and manufacturing of high-efficiency, low-cost monocrystalline PV cells, using unique processes and techniques that evolved from his work at UCEP. Dr. Rohatgi continues his research interests in the development of cost and efficiency roadmaps for attaining grid parity with silicon PV, and innovations in cell design and technology.
Under Dr. Rohatgi's leadership, Suniva has accomplished several industry firsts and achievements in manufacturing, technology, research, and development, including the fastest ramp-up to 100MW production in the industry; the raising of $130 million in capital following the formation of Suniva in 2007; the successful production of cell efficiencies exceeding 19% and R&D cell efficiencies exceeding 20%.
Dr. Rohatgi is an IEEE Fellow. He has published more than 370 technical papers in the PV field and has been awarded 16 patents. Dr. Rohatgi has been widely recognized for his research and development contributions:Named "Champion of PV" by Renewable Energy World Magazine, 2010.

Dr. Neelkanth G. Dhere has been working at the Florida Solar Energy Center, University of Central Florida (UCF), since 1990 where he holds the position of Program Director. He is also a Joint Professor at the UCF Departments of Mechanical, Materials and Aerospace Engineering and Electrical and Computer Engineering. At FSEC he has installed the largest of University facility in the World for preparation of photovoltaic CuIn1-xGaxSe2-ySy (CIGSeS) cells by selenization/sulfurization; prepared small area CIGSS cells with high efficiency (13.73%), developed 8.64% photoelectrochemical cells using thin-film PV cells and RuS2 photoanode for generation of hydrogen by splitting water, and studied module long-term exposure and module durability. He was a Visiting Senior Research Scientist at NREL, Golden, CO, during 1986-90. He was the first in USA to prepare high Tc superconducting thinfilms (Tc> 80K) based on bismuth in 1988. He worked as a Professor, Materials Science and Engineering, Instituto Militar de Engenharia, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, during June 1971-86. At IME, he installed one of the few complete fabrication lines in the World to produce first-generation CdS/Cu2S thin film solar cells and prepared a 30cm x 30cm fully encapsulated CdS/Cu2S minimodule. He worked as a Research Fellow, Comissão Nacional de Atividades Espaciais (CNAE), São José dos Campos, SP, Brazil, during July 1970-71 and as a Head, Techniques Laboratory, Physical Research Laboratory, Ahmedabad, India, during 1966-70. At PRL and CNAE, he installed new laboratories and directed research on thin film deposition, hybrid microelectronics, wire and die bonding, photolithography and packaging, and space simulation.

Dr. Dhere has published two Book Chapters: N. G. Dhere and R. S. Bennur, Use of Solar Energy to Produce Hydrogen in "Hydrogen Fuel: Production, Transport and Storage," (Ram Gupta, Editor), CRC Press, (2008), pp. 227-282; and N. G. Dhere, High Tc Superconducting Thin Films, Chapter 1 in "Thin Films for Emerging Applications, Physics of Thin Films" Vol. 16, (M. H. Francombe and J. L. Vossen, eds), Academic Press, (1992), pp. 1-143. He holds one patent and has published over 50 papers in refereed Journals and over 150 papers in Conference Proceedings and other publications.

Dr. Dhere has provided guidance to a total of 41 (28 at UCF) M.S. and Ph.D. students. Dr. Dhere is the Eldest Ph. D. in the Family Holding Guinness Book World Record for Most (All Five Members, Three Brothers and Two Sisters All Born to the Same Parents) Doctorates. He is a Fellow, American Vacuum Society (2003), Founder-President (1979-80) and Emeritus Member, Brazilian Vacuum Society. He was the Chairperson of the SPIE Reliability of Photovoltaic Cells, Modules, Components, and Systems Conference in 2008 and 2009, Chairperson, AVS Florida Chapter 2004, Program Chairperson, Joint Symposium of the Florida Society for Microscopy, Florida Chapter of the American Vacuum Society(AVS), March 2005, and Co-Chair, National Thin Film Module Reliability Team since 2002. He has received the 2003 UCF Research Incentive Award, and Institute of Electrical and electronic Engineers Region 3 Outstanding Engineer Award in 2002.

Dr. Vikram Dalal, Whitney Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Iowa State, received his B.E.(Elec.Engr.) degree from University of Bombay, India in 1964 and his Ph.D. in EE from Princeton in 1969. He has an extensive research record in worked in both industry and academia, and has been at Iowa State since 1988. He has graduated 25 Ph.D. students and over 30 M.S. students. His primary research interests are in photovoltaic energy conversion materials and devices and semiconductor processing. He has published ~160 papers and is a fellow of IEEE, American Physical Society and AAAS. He has been Director of MRC since 1999.

For further detail one can visit :   http://www.mrc.iastate.edu/NewStaff/VikramDalal.htm

Ayodhya N. Tiwari is the head of the Laboratory for Thin Films and Photovoltaics, Empa-Swiss Federal Laboratories for Material Science and Technology, and Tituar Professor at ETH Zürich, Switzerland. He is the Chairman and a cofounder of Flisom AG. The Flisom company has developed proprietary manufacturing equipment and processes for low cost production of flexible monolithic solar modules with roll-to-roll processes.

He has more than 30 years of R&D experience in various photovoltaic technologies. He is a co-author of more than 200 research publications and about 240 conference presentations including numerous invited papers and talks. He has co-chaired or co-organised several international conferences, co-edited special issues of leading journals on solar cells and thin films, is serving on the editorial boards of journals. He has been advisor to various institutions and PV-Expert delegation member of EU and other national agencies. Dr. Tiwari is a co-recipient of several awards and recognitions, his 9 students have won young scientist and other awards (13 in total) at international conferences for innovative research.

Important contributions of Tiwari’s group include: development of highest record efficiency flexible solar cells: 18.7% efficiency CIGS and 13.8.% efficiency CdTe solar cells with processes suitable for roll-to-roll manufacturing; monolithic interconnected flexible solar modules; more than 19% efficiency CIGS and 15.5% efficiency CdTe solar cells on glass with processes suitable for in-line production; simple and safe non-vacuum deposition processes for CIGS and Kesterite solar cells.  

Prof. Dr. Ayodhya N. Tiwari
Head, Laboratory for Thin Films and Photovoltaics
Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Material Science and Technology
Überlandstrasse 129,
CH-8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland
Tel: +41-58765 4130 (Direct); +41-58765 5511 (central)
Fax:+41 5876 6244
e-mail: ayodhya.tiwari@empa.ch
www.empa.ch/tfpv

Biography:

Dr. Tan received his B.E. (Hons) in Electrical Engineering from the University of Melbourne in 1992, after which he worked with Siemens (currently known as Osram) in Malaysia as a quality assurance engineer. In 1997, he was awarded the PhD degree from the Australian National University for his dissertation on "Ion beam effects in GaAs-AlGaAs materials and devices".

He is currently an Associate Professor in the Department of Electronic Materials Engineering of the Research School of Physics and Engineering at the Australian National University. He has published/co-published over 250 journal papers and several review articles and book chapters. He is also a co-inventor in 4 US patents related to laser diodes and infrared photodetectors.

His research interests include epitaxial growth of low-dimensional compound semiconductors, ion-implantation processing of compound semiconductors for optoelectronic device applications, and optoelectronic devices.

Dr. Tan is a Senior Member of the IEEE. He is also the chair of the ACT Chapter of the IEEE Photonics and Electron Devices Societies.

Bio-Sketch
Dr. Bhat has over 25 plus years of experience in thin film technology and business management. He is a recognized expert in thin film process and equipment technology. A skilled business manager, he has been instrumental in commercializing several technologies. Dr. Bhat has broad expertise in overcoming technology limitations in a production environment, while minimizing costs and maximizing quality. His work spans applications such as thin film battery storage, renewable energy systems and vacuum processing tools. Dr. Bhat has published over sixty five articles in technical journals, and has appeared as an invited speaker at conferences around the world. He is Founder and President of ProtoFlex Corporation, CO,USA. Responsible for overall corporate management, including business planning, product development, and marketing plans. ProtoFlex produces and sells thin film deposition tools and instruments for use around the world.  These systems provide cost-effective designs for fabrication of flexible thin film electronics, batteries, and photovoltaics. Dr Bhat has worked as Director of Operations, Infinite Power Solutions, Inc, CO,  President, Materials Research Group, Inc, CO, and Director of Technology, Glasstech Solar, Inc, CO.

Tentative topic: “Manufacturing aspect of thin film solar cells”

Bio-Sketch
Dr. Jatindra Kumar Rath, born on 14.01.1960 in India, obtained his Ph.D in defect solid state at I.I.T. Madras in 1986. After working as a research scientist at I.A.C.S. Calcutta, during which he was for one year at Phillips University, Marburg as United Nations Fellow, he joined Utrecht University in 1995 as post. doc. In 2000, he became full tenured Assistant Professor in the research group Physics of Devices, a part of the section Nanophotonics,  Debye Institute for Nanomaterials Science, Utrecht University. He has over 25 years of experience in thin films silicon materials and solar cells. He has published more than 220 Paper in International journals and conference proceedings. He has co-supervised 9 PhD students and a number of Masters and Bachelors projects.  He has successfully obtained and supervised many national projects on thin film solar cell research and technology development. His main research interests are; fabrication of advanced materials, such as nanocrystalline silicon and quantum dots by very high frequency PECVD using in situ plasma and growth diagnosis tools, transient and dusty plasmas, multijunction and heterojunction solar cells, solar cells on nano- and micro-textured cheap plastics, quantum dots and intermediate band gap solar cells, upconverter solar cells, light trapping and transparent conductive oxides. From 1st June 2012 he is the Lab manager for the Utrecht University lab. at High Tech Campus, Eindhoven.

Bio-Sketch
Professor David J. Norris is currently the Director of the Optical Materials Engineering Laboratory and Professor of Materials Engineering at ETH Zürich. Prof. Norris received his B.S. and Ph.D. degrees in Chemistry from the University of Chicago (1990) and MIT (1995), respectively. After a NSF postdoctoral fellowship at the University of California, San Diego, he joined the NEC Research Institute in Princeton in 1997. He was then an Associate Professor (2001-2006) and Professor (2006-2010) of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science at the University of Minnesota.  In 2010, he accepted his current position at ETH.
Prof. Norris is a Fellow of the American Physical Society and the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He has served as editor for Photonics and Nanostructures and as a member of the editorial board for Chemistry of Materials and Advanced Functional Materials. In 2006-2007, he was an Alexander von Humboldt Fellow at the Technical University of Munich. He was a member of the Advisory Board for the Petroleum Research Foundation in Washington, D.C. In addition to numerous scientific review panels in the US and Europe, Prof. Norris has been a consultant for several international corporations on the topic of optical nanomaterials.

Bio-Sketch
Enn Mellikov received his PhD degree of from Tallinn Polytechnic University, Estonia at 1977 and his DSc degree in Semiconductor Materials Science from Academy of Science of USSR, Sverdlovsk, in 1987. He is the Professor and the Director of the Department of Materials Science at Tallinn University of Technology. He is a cofounder and co-owner of crystalsol OÜ and crystalsol GmbH .He has more than 35 years of R&D experience in materials science and more than 15 years’ experience in various photovoltaic thin films and powder materials technologies. He is a member of Academy of Sciences of the Republic of Estonia and co-author of more than 150 research publications in international journals and about 250 conference presentations including numerous invited talks. He was the head of EU centre of Excellence of PV materials and solar cells and is the head of National Centre of Materials for Sustainable Development. He has co-chaired or co-organised several international and national conferences, is serving on the editorial boards of different journals. At the moment his research is turned to kesterite materials, to the development and the use these materials in form of powder based layers and thin films in solar cells.

For further detail one can visit : www.ttu.ee/en/department-of-Materials-Science

Bio-Sketch
Harin S. Ullal, Ph.D. works for the National Center for Photovoltaics at the National Renewable Energy (NREL) in Golden, Colorado USA. He has more than 32 years professional experience in solar electric technologies. Dr. Ullal worked at ARCO Solar from 1980 to 1985 as a Senior Research Scientist. He was the Inventor of the ZnO/Metal “Back Reflector” in the a-Si solar cell technology, which is now an industry wide standard and is used worldwide. He was awarded the “Innovator of the Month Award” by then ARCO Solar, V.P. - R&D, Dr. Charlie Gay. In January 1986, he joined the Solar Energy Research Institute which was elevated to a National Lab and was renamed NREL. He is the winner of the prestigious Francis Van Morriss Award. He was selected from about 2000 NREL talented staff. He is also the winner of two NREL Director’s Awards. He is also the joint winner of six (6) prestigious R&D Awards (the Oscar for Technological Innovation) working with the U.S. Thin Film PV Industry over the past two decades. He was also the runner-up for the World Technology Network Award, London, England, 1999. He has several plenary and invited presentations to his credit in thin film solar electric technology worldwide. He has numerous presentations and publications to his credit. Dr. Ullal was an International Consultant to the Indian Ministry of Non-Conventional Energy Sources (MNES, now MNRE), Government of India, New Delhi, India and the United Nations Industrial Development, Organization; Vienna, Austria. He was instrumental in setting up the Solar Rural Electrification project in the Sunderban Islands in West Bengal, India. Currently, there are about 80,000 solar-home- lighting systems installed in the island impacting the lives of some half million people. Several Hedge Fund Managers, Investment Bankers, Venture Capitalists, Science Writers, and new start-ups CEOs seek his professional advice and help on  thin film solar electric technologies in particular and solar cell technology in general. He has worked in the IEEE PVSC Program Committee for several years and has served as Session Chair at the International Conferences on several occasions. He has a Ph.D. in Materials Science from the University of Kentucky, 1979.

Bio-Sketch
Professor K.L.Narasimhan was till recently a Professor in the Dept. of Condensed Matter and Materials Science at TIFR and is currently a Visiting Professor at IIT Bombay. His research interests are in the area of a-Si:H, Organic semiconductors- materials and devices and photovoltaics.

Bio-Sketch
Dr R. Bhattacharyya took his Ph.D from IT, BHU in the year 1971. From 1972 onward he has been with the National Physical Laboratory (NPL), New Delhi. He superannuated in the year 2003 and then worked at various places to return again to NPL in January 2006 as an Emeritus Scientist and worked till September 2008 in that capacity. All his professional life he has been involved with the practice of Science & Technology of Thin films. He has been the key person to initiate Plasma based processing of thin films at NPL which developed as a major activity in later years. He has guided some 8 students for PhD/MTech and published more than 110 papers, delivered numerous invited talks and has PECVD related process patents to his credit for application to PV and related devices. He was involved in developing complete technology packages for Space Qualified Professional optical coatings for ISRO & HAL (licensed to 2 firms), Amorphous Silicon based PV, X-ray detectors, OASLM, DLC coatings for Project NAG of DRDO, Multilayer metallization of phase shifters for RADARS(Akash-DRDO) and a large number of other coatings for photonics ,MEMS & Sensors and Nano technology requirements.

 He has been awarded by NRDC and MRSI (Medal Lecture).

He has served as Consultant to M/S HHV, Bangalore, M/S Samtel Colour, Gaziabad, DST -SERI (GOI), Techno India (Kolkata) & others. Presently he works as an Adjunct Professor at BESUS -Howrah, & MIT-Manipal  and  as  a visiting faculty at DTU Delhi where he teaches Nanotechnology to M. Tech students and guiding research . He is also involved in various DST PACs as an expert member. He has been instrumental in launching DST-SERI’s Plasmonic & Nanostructured Solar cell initiative.

Bio-Sketch
Bodh Raj Mehta is currently Professor of Physics and Schlumberger Chair professor of Semiconductor Physics at Indian Institute of Technology Delhi, New Delhi, India. He did his M Sc in Physics from Punjabi University Patiala, M Tech in Solid State Materials and Ph D in Physics from IIT Delhi. He has worked as post-doctoral fellow at University of British Columbia, Canada; guest scientist at University of Saarbrucken, Germany; and guest professor at University of Duisburg, Germany. He has about 25 years experience in  teaching and research in science and technology of thin film and nanostructured materials. His research interests include Nanoparticle-hydrogen interaction in Rare earth metals and Pd-alloy nanoparticles; Synthesis and applications of oxide semiconductor nanostructures, Inorganic-organic hybrid junctions, Nanostructured resistive memory and solar cell devices. He is the recipient of MRSI Medal (Material Research Society of India, 2002), DAAD Fellowship (Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst, 2000) and Marie Curie International Fellowship (European Commission, 2006). He is on the Editorial Board of Journal of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (JNN) and has about 160 research publications. In addition to other sponsored research projects, he is the Principal Coordinator of the ‘Unit on NanoScience’ (Nanomission) at IIT Delhi; Co-coordinator of Nano Research Facility at IIT Delhi, Principal Coordinator of the Tri-National IBSA (India-Brazil-South Africa) Collaborative Project on ‘Advanced Materials’ and Coordinator of Lockheed Martin Inc. USA - IIT Delhi Collaboration on ‘Nanotechnology and Nano-Biotechnology’.  One of his projects ‘NanoSwitch’ has been selected by European Commission as a ‘Success Story’ project.