On September 17th, invited by Prof. Hua Jianli, Prof. Yi-Bing Cheng (Academician of the Australian Academy of Engineering, from Monash University) visited our school.

    First, Prof. Yi-Bing Cheng gave a lecture titled “Solution Processed Solar Cells”. Prof. Hua Jianli hosted the lecture and Prof. Zhu Weihong, Xie Yongshu, Zhong Xinhua, Zhao Chunchang also attended the lecture.

    In the lecture, Prof. Cheng Demonstrated advantages of screen printing technology for preparing solar cell to participants by some vivid videos, which let them had a more comprehensive and intuitive understanding to deal with the solution prepared for solar cells. Recently, perovskite with its unique superiority, had made remarkable development in the field of solar cell, which attracted a large number of scientific researchers. He also comprehensively introduced the research progress achieved in perovskite cells of his group. More importantly, perovskite cells hopefully provided a good technical foundation for future commercial and industrial production through the screen printing technology for large area preparation.

    Prof. Yi-Bing Cheng also visited the Key Laboratory for Advanced Materials. Prof. Zhu Weihong made a detailed introduction of the construction, development and the proposal of application for State Key Laboratory, and Prof. Yi-Bing Cheng gave some valuable suggestions on the sustainable development for the Key Laboratory.

CV of Prof. Yi-Bing Cheng:
    Diploma in Silicate Materials, Wuhan Univ. of Tech., China, 1978
    MEng in Inorganic Materials, Wuhan Univ. of Tech., China, 1983
    PhD in Ceramics, Univ. of Newcastle-on-Tyne, UK, 1989
    Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering

RESEARCH INTERESTS
    Professor Cheng specialises in inorganic materials and composites. His research interests in this area span a wide range of topics in synthesis of nano materials, ceramic processing, microstructure development and materials applications in aggressive conditions. He has particular interests in the development of non-oxide ceramics and composites, especially sialons.

    Since 2001, Dr Cheng has been involved in the research of nano-TiO2 based dye sensitised solar cells (DSSCs). His work in this area mainly lies in the development of nanostructured working and counter electrodes, and construction of solar cell devices. He has special interests in the engineering aspects of the DSSC technology. In recent years, he has made focused efforts in the development of flexible DSSCs on plastic substrates and processing of DSSCs by printing technologies.
He is a chief investigator of the novel ceramic-polymer composites for fire-performance cable applications in the Cooperative Research Centre for Polymers. This award-winning technology has been commercialised by an Australian company.

TEACHING INTERESTS
    Mechanical Properties of Materials
    Ceramic Technology
    Engineering Ceramics
    Glass and Glass-Ceramics