Jenny Nelson facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Jenny Nelson
FRS FInstP
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Jenny Nelson at Royal Society admissions day in London, July 2014
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| Born |
Jennifer Nelson
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| Nationality | Irish |
| Alma mater | University of Cambridge (BA) University of Bristol (PhD) |
| Awards | Armourers and Brasiers' Company Prize (2012) Faraday Medal and Prize (2016) |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Solar cells |
| Institutions | Imperial College London |
| Thesis | Optics of fractal clusters: with reference to soot (1988) |
| Doctoral advisor | Michael Victor Berry |
Jenny Nelson is a Professor of Physics at Imperial College London. She works in the Blackett Laboratory and leads the Climate change mitigation team at the Grantham Institute - Climate Change and Environment. Her main work involves making solar cells better.
Learning and Studying
Jenny Nelson studied at two famous universities in the UK. She went to the University of Cambridge and then the University of Bristol. In 1988, she earned her PhD degree from Bristol. Her research there was about how light interacts with tiny, complex shapes called fractal clusters.
Researching Solar Power
Professor Nelson's research focuses on improving devices that turn sunlight into electricity. These devices are called photovoltaic devices, or simply solar cells. She uses different methods, like computer models, simulations, and experiments. Her goal is to make solar cells work even better by understanding the materials they are made from.
Over the past 25 years, Jenny Nelson has worked with many types of materials. These include tiny molecular materials and special inorganic materials. She also uses hybrid materials that mix organic and inorganic parts. By studying how these materials behave with light and electricity, she helps design better solar cells. Her work has even caught the attention of big companies.
Since 2010, Professor Nelson has also been looking at how solar power can help fight climate change. Solar cells can create electricity without releasing carbon dioxide. This helps reduce pollution and protect our planet. She even wrote a popular book called The Physics of Solar Cells.
Her research often looks at new materials that are very tiny or have a special structure. She compares her ideas with real-world experiments. Most importantly, she uses science to solve big problems like getting enough energy. Her main focus since 2000 has been on understanding how organic materials work in solar cells.
Jenny Nelson is considered one of the top 100 materials scientists in the world. This is because her research papers are often used and referenced by other scientists.
In 2013, she joined a special program in Wales called Sêr Cymru. This program aims to boost solar research in Wales. So, besides her work at Imperial College, she is also a Professor of Physics at SPECIFIC, Swansea University. This project is seen as a great example of scientific progress in Wales.
Awards and Special Recognitions
In 2014, Jenny Nelson was chosen as a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS). This is a very high honor for scientists in the UK. It means she is recognized for her amazing contributions to science.
She was honored for developing new ways to understand solar cells. She found out how the materials in these devices affect how well they work. Her research helped improve many types of materials used in solar cells. She also created tools and methods to test and design these devices, which has been very helpful for industries.
Professor Nelson has received many other awards too. She won the Armourers and Brasiers' Company Prize in 2012. In 2016, she won the Faraday Medal and Prize. This award was for her groundbreaking work on tiny, structured materials used in solar cells. In 2017, her students at Imperial College London gave her an award for being an excellent supervisor. They said she truly believed in them and helped them a lot.
