Imagine buildings in which the windows allow the sun's light to enter, and at the same time capture the energy from the sun needed to meet all their energy needs. In this seemingly futuristic scenario, the windows become ...
Optics & Photonics
Oct 21, 2013
0
0
Two crucial tasks exist for realizing high-efficiency polymer solar cells: increasing the range of the spectral absorption of light and efficiently harvesting photo-generated excitons. In this work, Förster resonance energy ...
Nanophysics
Aug 20, 2013
0
1
Energy consumption is growing rapidly in the 21st century, with rising energy costs and sustainability issues greatly impacting the quality of human life. Harvesting energy directly from sunlight to generate electricity using ...
Optics & Photonics
Aug 14, 2013
0
0
Natural photosynthesis—the remarkable ability of plants to transform sunlight into useful energy—powers virtually all life on Earth. But that's not enough for some people.
Materials Science
Aug 7, 2013
0
1
Stanford University scientists have created the thinnest, most efficient absorber of visible light on record. The nanosize structure, thousands of times thinner than an ordinary sheet of paper, could lower the cost and improve ...
Nanomaterials
Jul 18, 2013
2
0
Most efforts at improving solar cells have focused on increasing the efficiency of their energy conversion, or on lowering the cost of manufacturing. But now MIT researchers are opening another avenue for improvement, aiming ...
Nanomaterials
Jun 26, 2013
5
0
(Phys.org) —The Energy Department's National Renewable Energy Lab has announced a world record of 31.1% conversion efficiency for a two-junction solar cell under one sun of illumination.
Energy & Green Tech
Jun 25, 2013
4
0
(Phys.org) —Using a powerful combination of microanalytic techniques that simultaneously image photoelectric current and chemical reaction rates across a surface on a micrometer scale, researchers at the National Institute ...
Materials Science
May 15, 2013
0
0
(Phys.org) —For some solar cells, the future may be fluorescent. Scientists at Yale have improved the ability of a promising type of solar cell to absorb light and convert it into electrical power by adding a fluorescent ...
Optics & Photonics
May 9, 2013
1
0
(Phys.org) —A University of Illinois research group brought together aspects of condensed matter physics, semiconductor device engineering, and photochemistry to develop a new form of high-performance solar photocatalyst ...
Materials Science
Apr 23, 2013
0
0
