Shubhra Bansal (Mechanical Engineering) has received the prestigious CAREER award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to develop novel Pb-free and stable mixed halide-chalcogenide perovskite materials for high-efficiency solar cells. Pb-based organic-inorganic hybrid perovskite solar cells (HPSCs) have shown tremendous promise with a big leap in efficiency, however, toxicity of Pb and instability of these materials is a challenge. Bansal will develop high-efficiency Pb-free perovskite solar cells via defect engineering and novel electron/hole transport layers. With this five-year grant, Bansal also will train underrepresented minority students in climate change and materials for renewable energy technologies. NSF CAREER Awards support junior faculty who exemplify the role of teacher-scholars through outstanding research and education. CAREER is among NSF’s most prestigious honors.

Bansal joined UNLV in 2015. Her research has focused on understanding the evolution of defects in materials and effect of defect engineering on reliability and metastability. Her research group at UNLV works on materials development and reliability analyses for thin-film photovoltaics, flexible electronics, sensors, and detectors. Her research has been funded by department of energy, and NSF and NASA EPSCoR programs.