Cutting-edge research in the field of solar energy as a source of renewable energy, from the photovoltaic effect to photocatalysis, is our business and primary mission.

The MIB-SOLAR Center originates from the diverse experience and skills matured over the past years at the Department of Materials Science. These skills are the result, in some cases, of decades of work and research on conventional photovoltaics. In other cases we productively and effectively applied to innovative materials for new solar energy generation the profound experience gained over the past years in other fields of materials science.
The MIB-SOLAR center has been created with the need to organize the skills so far developed in materials science and channelize them towards a new ambitious research and development project in solar energy, allowing a step-up and an increase in quality otherwise unattainable. This task, now a real achievement, has been made possible by the creation, sharing and development of fully equipped laboratories with state-of-the-art instrumentation for fabrication and characterization of materials and devices.
Our distinctive feature, which differs the MIB-Solar Center from other similar institutions, is the ability to offer research and development all the way through the entire technological chain, from the computational design of the material to the preparation and characterization of the device at pre-competitive level, with a close and continuous interaction between academia and industry.
This feature, combined with the variety of the offered research fields, provides a unique and groundbreaking example of research not only within the regional, but also within the national and international context.
The Center owns its main skills in the capture (materials) and conversion (photovoltaic devices) of solar energy, from conventional crystalline silicon to new generation thin film technologies.

The Center's main research activities concern the following technologies:

• MONO- AND MULTI-CRYSTALLINE SILICON SOLAR CELLS
• INORGANIC THIN FILM SOLAR CELLS
• ORGANIC AND HYBRID  SOLAR CELLS

THE CENTER’S ACTIVITY SPANS FROM THE ORIGINAL MATERIALS DESIGN TO THE FABRICATION AND CHARACTERIZATION OF DEVICES, FROM SMALL SINGLE CELLS TO MODULES AND PANELS.