RIT professor receives $400,000 grant from the Department of Energy for work with solar cells

Researching ways to create high-efficiency, low-cost solar cells is the goal of Rochester Institute of Technology professor Seth Hubbard. The grant Hubbard recently received is to lower the cost for solar cells. His research takes the substrates solar cells are grown on and makes them reusable.

If the cost for producing efficient solar cells can successfully be lowered, they could eventually be used in creating drones, smartphones or cars. Hubbard has extensive expertise in designing and creating the cells.

In addition to serving on the faculty at the School of Physics and Astronomy, Hubbard is a member of RIT’s Future Photo Initiative and director of RIT’s NanoPower Research Laboratories. At the research laboratories, the goal is to “harness the power of nanomaterials in energy conversion, energy storage and data and communication devices.”

Through 2023, Hubbard will work on this initiative with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, Arizona State University and Crystal Sonic, a company who specializes in these technologies. An RIT research scientist is also covered by the funding, as well as graduate students who work on the project.