solar cells tagged posts

Biomimetics: the epidermis of a rose petal is replicated in a transparent layer which is then integrated into the front of a solar cell. Credit: Illustration: Guillaume Gomard, KIT

Scientists increase the efficiency of solar cells by replicating the structure of petals. With a surface resembling that of plants, solar cells improve light-harvesting and thus generate more power. Scientists of KIT reproduced the epidermal cells of rose petals that have particularly good antireflection properties and integrated the transparent replicas into an organic solar cell. This resulted in a relative efficiency gain of 12%.

Photovoltaics works in a similar way as the photosynthesis of plants...

Plexcitons travel for 20,000 nanometers, a length which is on the order of the width of human hair. Graphic by Joel Yuen-Zhou

Scientists at UC SD, MIT and HarvardU have engineered “topological plexcitons,” energy-carrying particles that could help make possible the design of new kinds of solar cells and miniaturized optical circuitry. Within the Lilliputian world of solid state physics, light and matter interact in strange ways, exchanging energy back and forth between them.

“When light and matter interact, they exchange energy,” explained Assistant/Prof. Joel Yuen-Zhou. “Energy can flow back and forth between light in a metal (so called plasmon) and light in a molecule (so called exciton)...

Polymer solar cells manufactured using low-cost roll-to-roll printing technology, demonstrated here by professors Olle Inganäs (right) and Shimelis Admassie. Credit: Stefan Jerrevång/Linkoping university

Polymer solar cells have in recent years emerged as a low cost alternative to silicon solar cells. In order to obtain high efficiency, fullerenes are usually required in polymer solar cells to separate charge carriers. However, fullerenes are unstable under illumination, and form large crystals at high temperatures.

Now, a team of chemists led by Professor Jianhui Hou at the CAS set a new world record for fullerene-free polymer solar cells by developing a unique combination of a polymer called PBDB-T and a small molecule called ITIC...

Single nanocrystal spectroscopy identifies the interaction between zero-dimensional CdSe/ZnS nano crystals (quantum dots) and two-dimensional layered tin disulfide as a non-radiative energy transfer, whose strength increases with increasing number of tin disulfide layers. Such hybrid materials could be used in optoelectronic devices such as photovoltaic solar cells, light sensors, and LEDs. Credit: Brookhaven National Laboratory

It paves the way for better optoelectronic apps eg energy-harvesting photovoltaics, light sensors, LEDs. Scientists combined excellent light-harvesting properties of quantum dots with the tunable electrical conductivity of a layered tin disulfide semiconductor...