Title:

Managing broadband radiation for energy applications

Speaker:

Dr. Zongfu Yu

Affiliation:

Stanford University

When:

Monday, February 27, 2012 at 11:00:00 AM   Add to Calendar

Where:

MRDC Building, Room 4211

Host:

Dr. Sam Graham
sam.graham@me.gatech.edu
404.894.2264

Abstract

Sunlight and thermal emission consist of radiation of extremely broad bandwidth. Managing such broadband radiation for energy applications is a new challenge. It is not the first time in history that we must deal with broadband radiation, but the recent decade is the first time that we can use nanoscale control to manage broadband radiation energy. This “nano” add-on is nontrivial, carrying important new physics that could lead to game changing applications. Specifically in this talk, I will discuss the following questions: Why do we need to manage the sunlight in solar energy conversion devices? What are the general considerations for light management? What are the fundamental advantages of using nanoscale engineering?

Biography

Bio: Zongfu Yu is a postdoctoral scholar at the Center for Nanoscale Science and Engineering at Stanford University. He has numerous publications in the area of solar energy and integrated photonics, many of which are in high-profile journals and are frequently cited. He has co-authored a number of review articles and book chapters and has given many invited talks in conferences. Besides his academic interests, Zongfu co-founded a website which has been viewed by over 10 million visitors. Zongfu is a recipient of the Stanford University Postdoc Research Award (2010). He has a Ph.D. degree (2009) in Applied Physics, a M.S. degree (2008) in Management Science and Engineering, both from Stanford University, as well as a B.S. degree (2004) in Physics from the University of Science and Technology of China.