OK, so the headline is tongue in cheek, but Halloween is coming soon. As much as everyone want to demonize Carbon, I find this finding interesting for it’s uniqueness and timeliness.
Rutgers discovery paves way for development of efficient, inexpensive plastic solar cells
Finding reported in Nature Materials journal could boost role of solar-generated electricity as alternative to fossil fuels
NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. – Physicists at Rutgers University have discovered new properties in a material that could result in efficient and inexpensive plastic solar cells for pollution-free electricity production.
The discovery, posted online and slated for publication in an upcoming issue of the journal Nature Materials, reveals that energy-carrying particles generated by packets of light can travel on the order of a thousand times farther in organic (carbon-based) semiconductors than scientists previously observed. This boosts scientists’ hopes that solar cells based on this budding technology may one day overtake silicon solar cells in cost and performance, thereby increasing the practicality of solar-generated electricity as an alternate energy source to fossil fuels.
“Organic semiconductors are promising for solar cells and other uses, such as video displays, because they can be fabricated in large plastic sheets,” said Vitaly Podzorov, assistant professor of Physics at Rutgers. “But their limited photo-voltaic conversion efficiency has held them back. We expect our discovery to stimulate further development and progress.”
Podzorov and his colleagues observed that excitons – particles that form when semiconducting materials absorb photons, or light particles – can travel a thousand times farther in an extremely pure crystal organic semiconductor called rubrene. Until now, excitons were typically observed to travel less than 20 nanometers – billionths of a meter – in organic semiconductors.
“This is the first time we observed excitons migrating a few microns,” said Podzorov, noting that they measured diffusion lengths from two to eight microns, or millionths of a meter. This is similar to exciton diffusion in inorganic solar cell materials such as silicon and gallium arsenide.
“Once the exciton diffusion distance becomes comparable to the light absorption length, you can collect most of the sunlight for energy conversion,” he said.
Excitons are particle-like entities consisting of an electron and an electron hole (a positive charge attributed to the absence of an electron). They can generate a photo-voltage when they hit a semiconductor boundary or junction, and the electrons move to one side and the holes move to the other side of the junction. If excitons diffuse only tens of nanometers, only those closest to the junctions or boundaries generate photo-voltage. This accounts for the low electrical conversion efficiencies in today’s organic solar cells.
“Now we lose 99 percent of the sunlight,” Podzorov noted.
While the extremely pure rubrene crystals fabricated by the Rutgers physicists are suitable only for laboratory research at this time, the research shows that the exciton diffusion bottleneck is not an intrinsic limitation of organic semiconductors. Continuing development could result in more efficient and manufacturable materials.
The scientists discovered that excitons in their rubrene crystals behaved more like the excitons observed in inorganic crystals – a delocalized form known as Wannier-Mott, or WM, excitons. Scientists previously believed that only the more localized form of excitons, called Frenkel excitons, were present in organic semiconductors. WM excitons move more rapidly through crystal lattices, resulting in better opto-electronic properties.
Podzorov noted that the research also produced a new methodology of measuring excitons based on optical spectroscopy. Since excitons are not charged, they are hard to measure using conventional methods. The researchers developed a technique called polarization resolved photocurrent spectroscopy, which dissociates excitons at the crystal’s surface and reveals a large photocurrent. The technique should be applicable to other materials, Podzorov claims.
Collaborating with Podzorov on the research were postdoctoral researcher Hikmat Najafov, graduate students Bumsu Lee and Qibin Zhou, and Leonard Feldman, director of the Rutgers Institute for Advanced Materials, Devices and Nanotechnology (IAMDN). Najafov and Podzorov are also affiliated with IAMDN.
Funding was provided by the National Science Foundation’s Division of Materials Research and Japan’s New Energy and Industrial Technology Development Organization (NEDO).
So the carbon source for this plastic; is it oil or coal?
Hi Folks!
HAPPY CLIMATE FOOLS DAY!
To commemorate the 10:10 eco-snuff movie, I would like to suggest that October 10 henceforth be celebrated worldwide as Climate Fools Day.
Let this day forever be a reminder of how the eco-fascists blew themselves up with their own hateful propaganda, marking the beginning of the end of the global warming scam.
Can our internet-savvy friends please help create a website–something along the lines of “climatefools.org”–with links to the 10:10 eco-snuff movie. The objective is to shame these green bullies and remind them that civilized people won’t tolerate their unacceptable fascist behavior.
e.g. text on website page:
—————————–
-Ticking countdown- LEFT TO CLIMATE FOOLS DAY!
CLIMATE FOOLS DAY is a day of peace and sanity where the free peoples of the world celebrate:
– The end of eco-fascism
– Electricity and all its life-enriching benefits
– Oil and coal and all their life-enriching benefits
– Cows and all their tasty benefits
– All the good things about protecting and caring for our environment, minus the fraud that is carbon taxation, emissions trading, biofuels and other unproven renewable energy technologies
But No Pressure!
LESS WE FORGET
– 10:10 eco-snuff video
– Franny Armstrong’s Half-assed Hahaha Apology
– 10:10’s follow-up whiny “I just got a baby” apology
– Sony statement
– Kyocera statement
– Mind-boggling hypocritical statement by 350.org’s Bill McKibben, condemning the 10:10 movie while calling those who question the science of global warming “deniers”
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Nice to see that some people are still doing science not based on computer models. One day this “might” be practical and affordable technology.
For now, we need “fossil” fuels and nuclear.
Very good. Carbon is the best guy for many future discoveries and, as an element, should be worshiped. But don’t tell it to anyone. 😉
Oh! The irony!
Or should it be carbony?
Maybe we should get billions in research funds to figure out the most expensive way to convert CO2 in the atmosphere into rubrene. Kill two birds with one stone, make a fortune, all while consuming far more resources than the product could ever hope to counter, but it would sound so green they could not refuse it.
‘Tis only fitting that carbon serve Carbon-based life forms.
The Stuff of Life. Carl Sagan would have been stoked.
Maybe they should get together with the 2 University of Manchester scientists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novaselov who won the Nobel prize for Physics with a carbon compound called Graphene. They found it when they used sticky tape to get one atom thick layers from a pencil. Its potential uses seem very promising faster semiconductors that can take more heat and power than silicon.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/science-news/8043355/Nobel-Prize-for-Physics-won-by-Andre-Geim-and-Konstantin-Novoselov.html
Sounds nice but things like this rarely ever come to fruition. I would like to be proven wrong though.
Not to mention the importance of carbon nanotubes etc. Carbon is an extremely important element, not pollution.
Let us hope that such developments can yield better pricing than this below, advertised in an automatically generated link here in the UK.
Solar Electricitywww.tec-consultants.net
1.6KW £6,670 installed MCS cert. 2KW £8,350 anywhere in the UK
The price is horrendous for a system that is out of action for half the time (unless sited under a street lamp). Personally, I shall not consume £8,350 of electricity during the rest of my life.
A much more cost effective scheme to have complete independence would be a Straight Vegetable Oil fueled diesel generator, smart inverter & a few batteries. Leisure boating technology, in fact.
Still in the lab and quite a ways from practical use, but looks to be an important breakthrough. I do think solar has some good potential and it’s great to see some good practical science being done.
Any bets that Greenstrife and its fellow eco-warriors will denounce this as “damaging ti the environment” and a “sidetracking of valuable resources needed for wind technology?”
I’ve actually done some research in the field of carbon-based semi-conductors. Some people are hot & bothered by materials such as nanotubes, graphene, and even rubrene. But so far we haven’t seen the efficiency of these materials.
Effectively– “you’re doing it wrong”.
The carbon semi-conductor isn’t the most interesting part– we can make long strands of conjugated pi-systems– an electron superhighway, as it were. But the electrons just don’t jump like the do on a metal semiconductor or on silicon. The efficiency is 3% at most, compared to >30% with alloys of indium.
IMHO, it’s a pipe dream that any of these materials could match a silicon semiconductor you’d find in a $20 calculator. Carbon pi-systems still have interesting properties, just not the properties people in the semiconductor field are expecting.
LightRain says:
October 10, 2010 at 10:35 pm
Carbon is an element of life, unless one is a Carbon Vampire.
I hear they cast no Carbon Life footprint.
DocattheAutopsy says:
October 10, 2010 at 11:00 pm
I guess because we are looking for the CMOS line of solar panels.
What is Rubrene?
” Rubrene is used as a sensitiser in chemoluminescence and as a yellow light source in lightsticks.”
wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rubrene
Interesting materials research.
How about Solar Paint.
This story from The New Inventors, ABC TV Australia.
The invention involves the development of a completely printable organic solar cell based on semiconducting polymer nanoparticles dispersed in water. Essentially these tiny particles in suspension are a water-based paint, which can be printed or coated over large areas. In the first instance these coatings will be put onto plastic sheets that can be placed on the roof of a house. However, in the longer term it will be possible to directly paint a roof or building surface.
http://www.abc.net.au/tv/newinventors/txt/s3008638.htm
Carbon based energy cells have been around for millions of years. They are called leaves and convert sunlight into energy and push oxygen into the atmosphere.Much better idea.
CLIMATE FOOLS DAY FACEBOOK PAGE:
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100001675988958
Friend me now–No Pressure!
Carbon Unit Says;
Carbon Dixoid is Plant Food.
“DocattheAutopsy says:
October 10, 2010 at 11:00 pm”
Indeed, well said.
“Michael says:
October 11, 2010 at 1:35 am”
Yes the carbon infestation at the origin. VEGER, it’s OK, we are the creator!
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Even were it possible to collect one hundred percent of the energy reaching the surface of the earth by way of insolation (anybody else instantly flash on Robert A. Heinlein’s 1940 short story “Let There Be Light”?), is it possible for such solar panels to achieve either consistency of output or sufficient power density to make any real contribution to an industrial society?
The amount of light energy hitting any square meter of the earth’s surface (even at high altitude in relatively cloudless regions) is not all that impressive at a maximum of 950 Watts/m2. This was one of the important considerations when solar power satellites in geosynchronous earth orbit (GEO) were proposed in the 1980s.
Not only is solar irradiance beyond the atmosphere about half again greater, but in microgravity it is possible to deploy parabolic mirrors of enormous size (aluminized Mylar won’t blow away in vacuum, and micrometeor perforations are unlikely to significantly impair function) to gather and focus such energy. And a powersat in GEO could be made to function 24/7/365 without concerns about planetary rotation, cloud cover, or dusting the vast arrays of solar panels that would be required to make solar power even remotely practicable in places like Barbara Boxer’s Mojave Desert forbidden zone.
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Better, cheaper, smaller solar cells are irrelevant to world energy without the storage technology to hold a percentage of the energy from day to night and to cover periods when cloud or snow block the light. Only 17% grid storage is needed yet we see no real efforts to build such infrastructure or price energy in such a way that storage is profitable and is thus privately built. Its been functionally exuded from most carbon trading systems where they have been implemented. Just 15 years ago this was taught to anyone doing renewable energy courses at University, permaculture courses and other places where solar as discussed. Storage technology was developed including underground compressed air storage, battery complexes and solar salt ponds. All have proven profitable where tried commercially. Yet the IPCC an other bodies seem to have gone off the idea finding excuses to ignore the solution. This to me, someone trained in this field, is the strongest proof that the IPCC, Gore and the other advocates of climate change do not want a solution they only want an intractable problem to drive grant engines and political power.
“Carbon based solar panel.”
That would be a leaf then.