Laura Herz | |
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![]() Laura Herz in 2024 | |
Born | Laura Maria Herz |
Education | School Sisters of Notre Dame |
Alma mater | University of Bonn University of Cambridge (PhD) |
Awards | Nevill Mott Medal and Prize (2018) Faraday Medal and Prize (2024) |
Scientific career | |
Fields | Condensed matter physics semiconductors Ultrafast spectroscopy Photovoltaics Conjugated polymers [1] |
Institutions | University of Oxford University of Cambridge |
Thesis | Aggregation effects in conjugated polymer films studied by time-resolved photoluminescence spectroscopy (2002) |
Website | www-herz |
Laura Maria Herz FRS FInstP FRSC is a professor of physics at the University of Oxford. She works on femtosecond spectroscopy for the analysis of semiconductor materials. [1]
Herz studied physics at the University of Bonn and graduated in 1999. [2] She worked for two years as an exchange student at University of New South Wales. [3] She joined the University of Cambridge for her doctoral studies, earning a PhD in 2002. [2] [4] Here she worked on exciton and polaron dynamics in organic semiconductors. [5]
After her PhD, Herz was appointed a postdoctoral research fellow at St John's College, Cambridge, in 2001. [2] She was awarded an Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Advanced Research Fellowship in 2006 [6] and an EPSRC Open Fellowship in 2024. Herz joined the Department of Physics, University of Oxford as new faculty in 2003 and became a full professor in 2010. [2]
Herz is an expert in perovskite semiconductors. [7] She has researched the origins of the high charge-carrier mobilities in perovskite materials. [8] She demonstrated that their high efficiency in solar cells was due to long charge-carrier diffusion lengths and non-Langevin recombination. [9] [10] She identified that perovskite light emission is broad and can be used in Ultrafast lasers. [11] She recognised that the origin of this broadening is Fröhlich coupling to longitudinal optical phonons. [12]
Herz is also interested in self-assembly and nanoscale effects. [13] She works on Biomimetics light harvesting structures made of porphyrin nanorings [14] [15] to explore delocalised excited states. [16] [17]
She appeared on the BBC Radio 4 show In Our Time in 2015. [18]
In 2024, Herz was elected as Fellow of the Royal Society. [19]
Her short citation reads:
Laura Herz is distinguished for her study of light-harvesting and energy-conversion pathways in emerging semiconductors. Her research has pushed boundaries across interdisciplinary themes including light-matter interactions, charge-carrier dynamics, molecular self-assembly, biomimetic systems and nanoscience. Her work has been central to guiding materials synthesis, chemical engineering and advancing technology for renewable energy conversion.
Her awards and honours include: