Delegates from around the world came to U of T August 18-23 to to hear about new advances in nanomaterials and photovoltaics at the 25th international conference on amorphous and nanocrystalline semiconductors.
This silver anniversary conference marks almost half a century of scientific and technological progress in this field which in the early years was dominated by chalcogenide glasses and hydrogenated amorphous silicon and today has grown to cover a multitude of disordered and nanocrystalline materials including oxides, organics, and more.
This biennial conference took place in the Medical Sciences Auditorium and the Bahen Centre for Information Technology. The conference began with the Mott Lecture (a keynote plenary presentation named after the Nobel Laureate Sir Neville Mott) followed by the 25th Anniversary Plenary Lectures. The Mott Lecture was delivered by Hideo Hosono of the Frontier Research Center, Tokyo Institute of Technology, Japan who spoke on Amorphous Electrides: A Novel Class of Oxide Semiconductors.
The week-long conference attracted over 250 delegates from around the world, providing an opportunity for scientific exchange, collegial discussions, and fostering a venue amenable to understanding, discovery and innovation vis-à-vis new materials and devices, said ECE and MSE Professor Nazir Kherani, local-chair and co-chair of the organizing committee. Delegates attended sessions covering such topics as new photovoltaic nanomaterials, nano- and microcrystalline silicon growth, medical imaging devices and organic/inorganic heterojunction solar cells.
“We were truly honoured to be able to host this conference at the University of Toronto and in particular we were delighted to have this ICANS conference come to Canada for the first time in nearly 50 years since its inception,” said Professor Safa Kasap, of the University of Saskatchewan and general chair of the organizing committee.
