Spectroscopy and solar energy – in honor to Professor Renata Reisfeld

This short review summarizes briefly the outstanding scientific and technological contributions of Professor Reisfeld's group including students and scientists, as well as the fruitful collaboration with leading groups around the Globe at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. These research initiatives led to discoveries of fundamental processes in photochemical dynamics relevant to various scientific and technological fields such as optics, photoluminescence, photophysics, luminescence, spectroscopy, chemistry and physics of glasses, sol-gel technologies and polymer physics. Based on the well-known scientific and technological achievements, Professor Reisfeld was able to utilize successfully and in a novel way her spectroscopy and photochemistry expertise towards solar energy applications. This paper will review briefly the various technologies and multidisciplinary fields used by the group of Professor Reisfeld such as the use of luminescent lanthanides, transition metal-ions, polymers and organic dyes and nano-particles towards the goal of providing efficient luminescent solar concentrators (LSC).