Sentences with phrase «solar cells absorb»

Tiny hollow spheres of photovoltaic material trap and loop light the same way a whispering gallery does to sound, letting solar cells absorb more light.

Most solar cells absorb visible light to produce electricity, but his design harnesses both visible and ultraviolet light.

Not exact matches

One type, known as plastic, organic or polymer photovoltaic solar cells, uses conductive organic polymers or organic molecules to absorb light, transfer the charge and produce electricity.

Most solar cells are limited by how much energy their electrons can absorb.

These semiconductors can be used as an optical absorber material in solar cells, but so far have only achieved a maximum efficiency of 12.6 per cent, while solar cells made of copper - indium - gallium - selenide (CIGS) already attain efficiencies of over 20 percent.

A typical solar cell has a silicon semiconductor that absorbs sunlight directly and converts it into electrical energy.

It absorbs sunlight in the red and infrared parts of the spectrum and could be harnessed to boost the efficiency of solar cells.

Instead of sending sunlight directly to the solar cell, thermophotovoltaic systems have an intermediate component that consists of two parts: an absorber that heats up when exposed to sunlight, and an emitter that converts the heat to infrared light, which is then beamed to the solar cell.

Because the metal coatings absorb a lot of light, reflecting only a narrow set of wavelengths, Capasso suggests that they could also be incorporated into optoelectronic devices like photodetectors and solar cells.

In solution form, their solar absorber layer — the part made from the copper indium diselenide or CIGS materials and critical to the performance of the cell — can be easily painted or coated onto a surface.

Trapping light with an optical version of a whispering gallery, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have developed a nanoscale coating for solar cells that enables them to absorb about 20 percent more sunlight than uncoated devices.

They could store a charge from wind energy at night and absorb sunlight hitting their rooftop solar cells if parked during the day.

In the experimental set up devised by a team including Dongheon Ha of NIST and the University of Maryland's NanoCenter, the light captured by the nanoresonator coating eventually leaks out and is absorbed by an underlying solar cell made of gallium arsenide.

By covering these roofs with large, flat arrays of cylindrical thin - film solar cells (think massive installations of fluorescent tubes, only absorbing light rather than emitting it), Fremont, Calif. — based Solyndra, Inc., hopes to harness that energy.

Solar cells, for example, would be far more efficient if they reflected less light and absorbed more of it as energy.

Researchers have now used the moth eye structure as the basis of a highly efficient solar absorbing cell.

«Typical solar cells made of silicon are black because they absorb all visible light and some infrared heat — so those would be unsuitable for this application.»

A vast improvement over current nonreflective materials, the new technology could revolutionize solar cells, intensify light - emitting diodes, and possibly help solve mysteries in quantum mechanics by mimicking a «black body,» an object that absorbs all light.

It's more efficient than previous devices, the researchers say, because its two cells absorb more light than single - layer solar devices, because it uses light from a wider portion of the solar spectrum, and because it incorporates a layer of novel materials between the two cells to reduce energy loss.

As it thins to the atomic limit, it becomes fluorescent, making it useful for optoelectronics, such as light - emitting diodes, or light - absorbing devices, such as solar cells.

Stacked cells are currently the most efficient cells on the market, converting up to 45 percent of the solar energy they absorb into electricity.

But to be effective, solar cell designers need to ensure the connecting junctions between these stacked cells do not absorb any of the solar energy and do not siphon off the voltage the cells produce — effectively wasting that energy as heat.

«This should reduce overall costs for the energy industry because, rather than creating large, expensive solar cells, you can use much smaller cells that produce just as much electricity by absorbing intensified solar energy from concentrating lenses.

But this has proven challenging, because transparency in solar cells reduces their efficiency in absorbing the sunlight they need to generate electricity.

Another limitation is that materials genomics has been hitherto applied almost exclusively to what engineers call functional materials — compounds that can perform a task such as absorbing light in a solar cell or letting electrical current pass in transistor.

A new solar cell design could raise the energy conversion efficiency to over 50 % by absorbing the spectral components of longer wavelengths that are usually lost during transmission through the cell.

In theory, 30 % energy - conversion efficiency is the upper limit for traditional single - junction solar cells, as most of the solar energy that strikes the cell passes through without being absorbed, or becomes heat energy instead.

The plane's frame needed to be strong enough to carry a human pilot, several days» worth of resources and four heavy batteries, but light enough to fly on the solar energy absorbed by the 17,000 solar cells — each as thin as a human hair — mounted on its wing, fuselage and horizontal stabilizer.

Fox aims to turn these diamond films into a new kind of solar cell, one that generates electricity by absorbing heat rather than visible - light wavelengths.

According to Colsmann, another field of application is the integration of solar cells into buildings: Since the glass facades of high - rise buildings must often be shaded, it is an obvious option to use organic solar modules for transforming the absorbed light into electric power.

«We asked ourselves: Could we cut out the middle man — solar cells — and use the light - absorbing quality of nanographene alone to drive the reaction?»

The efficiency of solar cells depends on trapping and absorbing light and can be increased by using a back reflector: a mirror behind the solar cell material that reflects light that was not absorbed and leads it back into the solar cell.

Such materials display a strong absorption of ultraviolet or visible light, making them attractive as primary light absorbers in molecular solar cells and other devices of molecular optoelectronics.

It can absorb and release huge amounts of electricity at the drop of a hat and do so over and over, making it ideal for smoothing out the flow from wind turbines and solar cells.

Electrical energy to drive the catalytic reaction would come from solar - power cells — although eventually researchers might be able to modify the catalyst to absorb sunlight directly.

Most solar cells used in homes and industry are made using thick layers of material to absorb sunlight, but have been limited in the past by relatively high costs.

The Stanford team tested their technology on a custom - made solar absorber — a device that mimics the properties of a solar cell without producing electricity — covered with a micron - scale pattern designed to maximize the capability to dump heat, in the form of infrared light, into space.

A mixed - cation lead mixed - halide perovskite absorber for tandem solar cells.

Using different types of perovskites across multiple layers could allow solar cells to more effectively absorb a broader range of photons.

LAYER UP Researchers are betting on a class of sunlight - absorbing materials called perovskites to improve today's solar cells.

Perovskites could also harness solar energy in new applications where traditional silicon cells fall flat — as light - absorbing coatings on windows, for instance, or as solar panels that work on cloudy days or even absorb ambient sunlight indoors.

Perhaps, some scientists thought, this perovskite might someday be able to outperform silicon, the light - absorbing material used in more than 90 percent of solar cells around the world.

These results provide an important step towards possible future applications as a luminescent material, such as for lighting and displays, as well as light absorbers in solar cells and photocatalysts for producing solar fuel.

However, the photovoltaic cells now used to turn sunlight into electricity can only absorb and use a small fraction of that light, and that means a significant amount of solar energy goes untapped.

Researchers have made thin - film solar cells with absorbing layers just tens of nanometers thick, but such a fine film can allow much of the light to pass through before it has a chance to be absorbed.

Today, most solar cells are made of one material, which scientists have realized can convert a maximum of 33.5 percent of the absorbed solar energy.

PROVIDENCE, R.I. [Brown University]-- Research led by a Brown University Ph.D. student has revealed a new way to make light - absorbing perovskite films for use in solar cells.

Perovskite films are excellent light absorbers and are much cheaper to make than the silicon wafers used in standard solar cells.

From 1990 to 2010, the efficiency of solar cells only increased 1.3 percent, from converting 25.1 percent of absorbed light to 26.4 percent.

Test Cell 2 is currently set up to test bench - scale solar receivers, which are devices that absorb the concentrated solar energy from the sun and transfer it to a heat engine.