image: The project “Chiral Light-Emitting Diodes Based on Photonic Architectures” (RADIANT) received €3.6 million in funding from the European Union’s EIC Pathfinder Horizon programme in 2024. Its goal is to develop cost-effective, high-performance chiral LEDs that exploit the optical properties of scalable chiral metasurfaces, operating optimally in the visible to near-infrared spectrum. The results could be applied to fields such as display technology, optical communication, remote sensing, and advanced lighting systems. By leveraging the unique chiral response of chiral metasurfaces, RADIANT precisely modulates high photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY) quantum emitters such as perovskite nanocrystals, quantum dots, and organic semiconductors through advanced nanophotonic architectures that interact with light via optical resonances, enhancing and tuning light emission. RADIANT harnesses the potential of nanophotonics for optoelectronic technologies through cost-effective, scalable chiral metasurfaces produced by soft nanolithography, while reducing dependence on critical raw materials currently used in advanced LEDs. This will revolutionize the multi-billion-euro LED display market by combining technological innovation, economic feasibility and environmental sustainability. The project is coordinated by Spain’s State Agency of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), specifically the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona (ICMAB-CSIC). It began at the end of 2024 and also involves the universities of Vigo and Valencia; Lund University in Sweden; the Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Italy; and the Spanish company Zirka Innotech, S.L.
Credit: Universitat Jaume I of Castelló
William Thompson (Lord Kelvin) introduced the word "chiral" in 1894 to describe objects that cannot be superimposed on their mirror image, such as hands. In chemistry, there are substances or materials with a similar composition whose three-dimensional shapes do not match (enantiomers). Although they share similar characteristics, they differ in how they interact with polarized light or affect living organisms.
Providing chirality to other technologies —such as organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), perovskite LEDs (PELEDs), and quantum dot LEDs (QDOTLEDs)— is the challenge addressed by the RADIANT project, coordinated at the Universitat Jaume I in Castelló by Iván Mora Seró, director of the Advanced Semiconductors Group at INAM. Its application promises to revolutionize several sectors thanks to its enhanced optical properties, wide spectral range, and, above all, its ability to simplify display architectures and save up to 50% of their energy consumption.
The project “Chiral Light-Emitting Diodes Based on Photonic Architectures” (RADIANT) received €3.6 million in funding from the European Union’s EIC Pathfinder Horizon programme in 2024. Its goal is to develop cost-effective, high-performance chiral LEDs that exploit the optical properties of scalable chiral metasurfaces, operating optimally in the visible to near-infrared spectrum. The results could be applied to fields such as display technology, optical communication, remote sensing, and advanced lighting systems.
By leveraging the unique chiral response of chiral metasurfaces, RADIANT precisely modulates high photoluminescence quantum yield (PLQY) quantum emitters such as perovskite nanocrystals, quantum dots, and organic semiconductors through advanced nanophotonic architectures that interact with light via optical resonances, enhancing and tuning light emission.
RADIANT harnesses the potential of nanophotonics for optoelectronic technologies through cost-effective, scalable chiral metasurfaces produced by soft nanolithography, while reducing dependence on critical raw materials currently used in advanced LEDs. This will revolutionize the multi-billion-euro LED display market by combining technological innovation, economic feasibility and environmental sustainability.
The project is coordinated by Spain’s State Agency of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC), specifically the Institute of Materials Science of Barcelona (ICMAB-CSIC). It began at the end of 2024 and also involves the universities of Vigo and Valencia; Lund University in Sweden; the Fondazione Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia in Italy; and the Spanish company Zirka Innotech, S.L.
Iván Mora Seró is a researcher in the Department of Physics and the Institute of Advanced Materials. In 2022, he received the Award for Research Excellence from the Royal Spanish Society of Chemistry. One of the most cited researchers in his field, his more than 290 published articles have received over 37,000 citations. In 2017, he was awarded the prestigious European Research Council (ERC) Consolidator Grant to develop his project No-Limit, aimed at improving the efficiency of solar cells through the synergistic interaction of different materials and overcoming current photovoltaic conversion limitations.
RADIANT is the fourth EIC Pathfinder project involving researchers from the public university of Castelló. DYNAMO, coordinated by the Optical Research Group (GROC), and Ohpera, coordinated by the Photoactive Materials for Energy Group at INAM, were the first two projects funded in 2022. DYNAMO explores new spatial light modulators based on optical-acoustic coupling to overcome current device limitations. Ohpera investigates photoelectrochemical hydrogen production from water, as well as the generation of high-value-added chemicals.
In the same call in which RADIANT was selected, the project “Superradiant Perovskite Lasers at Room Temperature” (SUPERLASER) was also awarded funding. It is coordinated at the UJI by researcher Iván Mora Seró, with participation from Rosario Vidal’s group. SUPERLASER focuses on developing low-cost superradiant perovskite halide lasers. The goal is to create emitters that function as topological lasers with photonic crystal properties (without additional cavities), achieving high power and an extremely narrow linewidth, similar to that of single optical transitions.