The breakthrough of Solar sheet to captures 90 percent of sunlight

Researchers at the University of Missouri developed a solar sheet device that can capture 90 percent of sunlight or 70 percent more than today traditional solar panels. They have improved the ability of current PV panels to capture a broader range of wavelengths.

Traditional solar powered devices have a weakness in transforming light into electricity and can only capture a small band of wavelengths out of the wide range of wavelengths found in sunlight striking the earth. Researchers used a special thin, nantenna which is moldable sheet of small antennas to capture the wider range of wavelengths. The material will converts heat to electricity that can be used for industrial heat recycling or solar designs which its capable of collecting both optical sunlight and the near infrared band sunlight.

Patrick Pinhero, associate professor of chemical engineering, securing U.S. Department of Energy funding and fund from private investors to working to port the resulting device to a mass-producable design. He also assisted by Dennis Slafer of MicroContinuum, Inc., of Cambridge, Mass., a solar power and alternative energy firm.

In the matters of developing a complete material with electronic devices capable of harvesting heat and light collected by the nantenna, Professor Pinhero worked with researchers at the Idaho National Laboratory and Garrett Moddel, an electrical engineering professor at the University of Colorado. He ambitious to be able to deliver a finished material in the next five years.

Their finding has been published in the peer-reviewed Journal of Solar Energy Engineering.The researchers hope to get more advantage from solar energy is theoretically possible to bring them to the commercial market that can be bought by all people with cheaper price.