Dr Marta Llusca Jane

Marta Llusca is a Research Fellow at the University of South Australia’s (UniSA) Future Industries Institute (FII). She is a physics graduate and has a Master’s degree in Physical Engineering. She completed her PhD in Materials Science/Applied Physics at the University of Barcelona in 2015 and she joined UniSA as a postdoctoral researcher in March 2016. Since then, she has been working on high impact, industry-focused projects, undertaking fundamental science, and translating research into commercial products through meeting milestones under tight schedules. Marta’s research encompasses the engineering of surfaces via the application of thin film coatings, and extends to applications in the optical, automotive, defence, and renewable energy industry sectors.

 Marta received a Cum Laude qualification for her PhD thesis on thin film silicon solar cells. She worked on light managements strategies to enhance the efficiency of solar cells: she nano-textured the substrates and the contacts and she also used light conversion techinques.

Upon competition of her PhD, she became part of the Thin Film Coatings Group, at FII. She started working in Concentrator Photovoltaics investigating low-cost heliostat mirrors. Afterwards, she became the principal investigator at the Plastic Glazing project funded by the Malaysian Automotive and Robotics IoT Institute (MARii). The project aim was to develop and commercialise a highly durable infrared reflective coating for light-weight windows for electric buses. 

Marta is constantly participating in other projects such as her collaboration with the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), developing a linear variable band pass filter, or her previous collaboration with the Defence Science and Technology Group (DST), investigating mirror-like coatings for freeform optics for small satellites.

During her time at FII she has supervised over 10 international students from leading universities (ETH, Bath, Bordeaux, etc), 1 PhD student to completion, and is currently involved in supervising 4 full time PhD students.

Qualifications

• Doctor of Philosophy University of Barcelona