In a project launched under the 2017 ASPIRE League Research Grant (Type 1), Tokyo Tech Associate Professor Tsuyoshi Michinobu and co-researchers from HKUST, KAIST, NTU and Tsinghua U have been conducting collaborative research on organic thin film devices based on narrow band gap semiconducting polymers.

Michinobu, the principal researcher, held a meeting on March 13, 2018 to discuss the project’s research achievements. NTU Associate Professor Qichun Zhang, a co-researcher on the project, attended.

Researchers from Michinobu’s lab made presentations. Wei Li presented the main achievement of his doctoral thesis, and Dr. Yang Wang talked about the progress of the benzobisthiadiazole (BBT)-based semiconducting polymer project. NTU’s Zhang presented on the perovskite solar cell application of BBT-based semiconducting polymers. Meeting participants also considered other possible applications. The researchers and students reflected on the 2017 achievements and discussed the future direction of the project.

Summary of the research collaboration in 2017

1. 2017.6.18-6.23

Michinobu and Wang visited Singapore to present the research achievements on semiconducting polymers at ICMAT 2017, an international conference co-chaired by NTU’s Zhang. The project members discussed the research progress of each group.

2. 2017.8.21-11.24

Master’s student Koji Kanehira (Tokyo Tech) visited NTU and conducted project-related experiments at the Zhang group for three months.

3. 2017.10.15-2018.2.7

Doctoral student Kexiang Zhao (NTU) visited Tokyo Tech and conducted experiments for the project at the Michinobu group for about four months.

4. 2018.3.13

NTU’s Zhang visited Tokyo Tech. He attended the project meeting and gave a talk about his research in a seminar.

5. Research progress was also discussed with other co-researchers via email and Skype.