Single-celled solar — High Country News: "At Oregon and Portland State Universities, researchers are advancing the relatively new thin-film, dye-sensitized solar cells using diatoms' ready-made structural complexity. First, a transparent, conductive glass surface is coated with diatoms. Their organic matter is removed, leaving the skeletons, which are then impregnated with a nanoparticle solution containing highly absorbtive, photo-sensitive dye molecules and the semiconductor titanium dioxide.
The nanostructure of diatom skeletons increase the interaction between incoming photons and the dye molecules. Dye-sensitized solar is relatively environmentally safe, and scientists expect using the ready-made diatom shells will make the technology up to three times more efficient, and much cheaper."
No comments:
Post a Comment