Prof. Ralph Gottschalg was born and educated in Karlsruhe, Germany were he obtained a Diplom in Physics from the University Karlsruhe, Germany. This was followed by a MSc in Renewable Energy Systems Technology at Loughborough University. Ralph worked as a research engineer in the energy department of the Fraunhofer Institute for Systems and Innovations Technology, Karlsruhe, Germany, before joining CREST in 1996 to do a PhD on environmental effects on the performance of photovoltaic devices. Ralph is leading the Applied Photovoltaics research group within CREST since 2001. He currently is an EPSRC Advanced Research Fellow.