Yuriy and Sergey Smolin have each been selected to receive the Graduate College’s Research Excellence Award in recognition for their outstanding research and its impact on the field as well as the originality, creativity and significance of their work.
Yuriy's research on the exploration of innovative material development in polymers for energy storage and harvesting devices is very impressive and according to his professors, he has displayed innovation and creativity in his approach, has been published in significant journals, and, in his spare time, managed to serve as president of the CBE Graduation Student Association among other activities. His work highlights using an integrated strategy involving first-principles modeling, novel synthesis methods, and characterization to discover new polymers for solar conversion and energy storage applications. His experimental work has shown that integrating nanoscale polymers can improve solar power conversion efficiency by over 50% in dye-sensitized solar cells and can also double the energy storage in supercapacitors. Furthermore, his first-principles modeling work, which is coupled to his experimental work, provided novel insight into how polymer chemistry affects dye sensitized solar cell performance, and has shown that one can tune current-voltage behavior based on chemistry. Yuriy is very grateful for this prestigious award and would like to thank Prof. Kenneth Lau and Prof. Masoud Soroush, without whose guidance his success would not have been possible.
Sergey's accomplishments in the time he has been at Drexel are significant. Sergey’s research involves using ultrafast transient absorption/reflection spectroscopy to study emerging solar materials at their fundamental level. Working with Professors Jason Baxter and Steven May, Sergey studies perovskite oxide thin films for their photovoltaic potential. The research seeks to facilitate advancements which will lead to longer carrier lifetimes in these materials and the emergence of a new material class for solar technology. He holds himself to high standards, apparent in his academic standing and the quality of his research. His collaborations both in the U.S. and abroad are particularly impressive and not only serve him, but the college and University. Sergey is very grateful for this prestigious award and would like to thank his advisor, Dr. Jason Baxter, without whose guidance this success would not have been possible. Both Sergey and Yuriy are also thankful for support from their collaborators, the CBE department, Drexel University, and friends and family.