CPE attend Bilateral International Symposium on Flexible Electronics

^{Photo: Delegates from the NanjingTech-CPE bilateral workshop on Flexible Electronics_.}

The First International Symposium on Flexible Electronics and NanjingTech-CPE Bilateral Workshop was held in Nanjing, China on March 16th. The Opening Ceremony was attended by Academician and NanjingTech President Wei Huang , Mr. Bo Chen, Member of Qixia District Standing Commission and Head of Qixia District Organization Department, Prof. Yonghong Hu, Vice Chief of Qixia District, Mr. Yinlong Shen , Deputy Director of Nanjing Economic and Technological Development Zone Management Commission, Prof. Xuejun He, Assistant President of Nanjing Tech University, the CPE academic delegation headed by Dr Paul N Stavrinou and NanjingTech and CPE researchers and students.

Opening the workshop, Prof. Ling Huang, vice-dean of the Institute of Advanced Materials (IAM) noted Flexible Electronics, as a frontier field of research, has been developing very rapidly with a bright future spanning many applications. NanjingTech has co-established the Joint Research Center of Plastic Electronics with the CPE, and both sides are supporting its development through novel research and application programmes.

A total of 18 CPE academic staff and researchers made the week long-visit to Nanjing, which included presentations by academics from both institutions. Presentations from the CPE were given by Profs. M. Heeney, N. Stingelin, J. deMello and T. Anthopoulos, Drs M. McLachlan, J-S Kim, P. Barnes, J. Bannock, A. Perumal, Fei Dou and P. Stavrinou. The workshop focused on promoting academic exchange among researchers concerning topics such as high-performance organic semiconductor materials and devices, photonics, studies of high performance perovskite solar cells and functional two-dimensional nano-material applications. The symposium received over 100 papers, with 32 oral presentations and two poster sessions, delivered during the first two days. CPE students J. Shaw, F. Bottacchi, N. Wijeyasinghe, J. Wade, J. Zhang, G. Bovo and J. Yao presented their work in the poster sessions.   Follow on discussions, hosted at NanjingTech, allowed a free-flowing exchange of ideas and the formulation of plans for future exchange visits and collaborative ventures.  

The hospitality was outstanding with the CPE delegates treated to a number of cultural excursions, most notably a visit to the historic Dr. Sun Yat-sen Mausoleum, a wonderful boat trip through historic Nanjing City and a visit to the impressive Nanjing Museum.