Feng Yan

One of the things Feng Yan says he is looking forward to researching as a new associate professor in the School for the Engineering of Matter, Transport and Energy — one of the seven schools in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University — is to create better efficiency for solar energy conversion.

“Arizona State University is a great place for solar materials and solar devices research,” Yan says and credits that reputation as one of the reasons he decided to join the ASU faculty.

Yan’s research interests focus on the fabrication and characterization of novel materials applied to electronic and photonic devices for renewable and sustainable energy conversion and storage, including chalcogenides, perovskite oxides, and halides.

He has extensive experience in new materials design, thin-film solar cells, and nanoscale characterization of ferroelectric/multiferroics/photovoltaics using scanning probe microscopy.

Yan earned a National Science Foundation Faculty Early Career Development Program (CAREER) Award in 2020 as a faculty member at the University of Alabama. His CAREER Award, Photovoltaic Devices with Earth-Abundant Low Dimensional Chalcogenides, investigates an emerging solar technology based on low-dimensional chalcogenides as light absorbers that are potentially cost-competitive and sustainable. The materials used in his research are abundant on earth, non-toxic, and stable when exposed to sunlight under ambient conditions allowing for the industry to provide more affordable solar electricity options to consumers. Yan looks forward to continuing this line of inquiry as a faculty member at ASU.

Meet the newest faculty members of the Fulton Schools of Engineering here.

Written by Erik Wirtanen