Degradation of metal-organic halide perovskites when exposed to ambient conditions is a crucial issue that needs to be addressed for commercial viability of perovskite solar cells (PSCs). Here, a concept of encapsulating CH3NH3PbI3 perovskite crystals with a multi-functional graphene-polyaniline (PANI) composite coating to protect the perovskite against degradation from moisture, oxygen and UV ...

Lithium solid electrolytes can potentially address two key limitations of the organic electrolytes used in today's lithium-ion batteries, namely, their flammability and limited electrochemical stability. However, achieving a Li(+) conductivity in the solid state comparable to existing liquid electrolytes (>1 mS cm(-1)) is particularly challenging. In this work, we reveal a fundamental relations...

Ferroelectric domain walls are of great interest as elementary building blocks for future electronic devices due to their intrinsic few-nanometre width, multifunctional properties and field-controlled topology. To realize the electronic functions, domain walls are required to be electrically conducting and addressable non-destructively. However, these properties have been elusive because conduc...

Scanning tunneling microscopes (STM) and atomic force microscopes (AFM) are used to study biological materials. These methods, often capable of achieving atomic resolutions, reveal fascinating information regarding the inner workings of these materials. However, both STM and AFM require physical contact to the specimen. In the case of STM the specimen needs to be conducting as well. Here we int...

Evidence for reorientation of imidazolium rings in imidazolium methylsulfonate is demonstrated using solid-state NMR. This material is a model system for exciting new proton-conducting materials based on imidazole. Two advanced NMR methods, including 1H-13C and 1H-15N recoupled polarization transfer with dipolar sideband pattern analysis and analysis of the coalescence of 13C lineshapes are use...

Just as the boundary between land and water produces some of the most striking landscapes on earth, the boundary between two materials can give rise to outstanding phenomena in electronics. The pn-junction in semiconductors and two dimensional electron gases (2-DEG) causing the Quantum Hall Effects are but just two examples. On page xxx of this issue, Alves et al. show [1] that single interface...

The synthesis these past few years of novel organic molecules that spontaneously 9 self-assemble into a large variety of molecular architecture, particularly generating organogels, has 10 opened up new horizons for preparing functional materials. Here, we present an original 11 preparation path of such materials through the making of hybrid gels of these molecules together 12 with covalent poly...

The same actions resulted in formation of nanocavities in highly-oriented pyrographite (HOPG), suggesting the anodization to be responsible for removing the uppermost surface layers from the substrate [1]. A more complex behavior was observed for amorphous carbon materials. Both graphite-like [2] and well-conducting diamond-like carbon (DLC) films [3] showed either nanoprotrusions or nanocaviti...

Photovoltaic functions in organic materials are intimately connected to interfacial morphologies of molecular packing in films on the nanometer scale and molecular levels. This review will focus on current studies on correlations of nanoscale morphologies in organic photovoltaic (OPV) materials with fundamental processes relevant to photovoltaic functions, such as light harvesting, exciton spli...

André Schleife and Friedhelm Bechstedt Journal of Materials Research / Volume 27 / Issue 17 / 2012, pp 2180 ­ 2189 DOI: 10.1557/jmr.2012.147 Link to this article: http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0884291412001471 How to cite this article: André Schleife and Friedhelm Bechstedt (2012). Ab initio description of quasiparticle band structures and optical near­ edge absorption of transparent ...