The research was funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST).
Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati’s researchers have recently announced the development of an innovative perovskite semiconductor technology. This technology improves the performance and stability of solar cells while also enabling advanced memory devices for future computing applications.
Under the leadership of Prof. Parameswar K. Iyer from the Department of Chemistry and the Centre for Nanotechnology, the researchers unveiled a molecular interface-engineering approach using specially designed donor-acceptor organic molecules.
The specification of this innovation is ultrathin organic layers, measuring just 10–15 nanometres, inserted between the charge-transport and perovskite layers to reduce defects and facilitate smoother charge transfer.
The breakthrough enabled perovskite solar cells to achieve a power conversion efficiency of 25.73%, placing them among the leading devices in this category. The cells also demonstrated impressive durability, retaining nearly 90% of their original performance after long-term ambient storage and approximately 75% of their original performance under continuous thermal and light stress.
Beyond solar energy, the researchers successfully integrated the same formamidinium (FA)-based perovskite material into memristor devices. These devices exhibited stable low-power switching, multistate memory functionality, and reliable endurance, making them promising candidates for neuromorphic computing, artificial intelligence hardware, and next-generation non-volatile memory technologies.
The research was funded by the Department of Science and Technology (DST). It has multiple patent filings and publications in Advanced Functional Materials.
Speaking about the real-world usage of the developed materials, Prof. Parameswar K. Iyer, Professor, Department of Chemistry, IIT Guwahati, said, “This work demonstrates the potential of perovskite-based semiconductor technologies for next-generation solar cells and memory devices. The synthesized novel organic molecules enable improved interfacial engineering for highly efficient and stable solar energy conversion, while the same material platform exhibits reliable resistive switching for advanced memory and neuromorphic computing applications. Such advances could accelerate the large-scale commercialization of integrated optoelectronic systems combining energy harvesting, information storage, and intelligent computing within a single technological framework.”
