photoanodes tagged posts

New materials are created through deposition onto disks, which are then tested to determine their properties. Credit: Caltech

A new materials discovery approach puts solar fuels on the fast track to commercial viability. Combining computational with experimental approaches, researchers identify 12 new materials with use in solar fuels generators. Researchers at Caltech and Berkeley Lab have – in just 2 years – nearly doubled the number of materials known to have potential for use in solar fuels.

Researchers are exploring a range of target fuels, from hydrogen gas to liquid hydrocarbons, and producing any of these fuels involves splitting water...

A piece of fabric was woven with special strands of material that harvest electricity from the sun and motion. Credit: Georgia Tech

Georgia Institute of Tech researchers have developed a fabric that can simultaneously harvest energy from both sunshine and motion. Combining two types of electricity generation into one textile paves the way for developing garments that could provide their own source of energy to power devices such as smart phones or GPS. “This hybrid power textile presents a novel solution to charging devices in the field from something as simple as the wind blowing on a sunny day,” said Prof. Zhong Lin Wang.

To make the fabric, Wang’s team used a commercial textile machine to weave together solar cells constructed from lightweight polymer fibers with fiber-based triboelectr...