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Higher efficiency organic solar cell |
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Monday, 16 July 2007 |
Nobel laureate Alan Heeger, professor of physics at UC Santa Barbara, worked with Kwanghee Lee of Korea and a team of other scientists to create a new "tandem" organic solar cell with increased efficiency. The discovery marks a step forward in materials science.
Tandem cells are comprised of two multilayered parts that work together
to gather a wider range of the spectrum of solar radiation ---- at both
shorter and longer wavelengths. "The result is six and a half percent
efficiency," said Heeger. "This is the highest level achieved for solar
cells made from organic materials. I am confident that we can make
additional improvements that will yield efficiencies sufficiently high
for commercial products." He expects this technology to be on the
market in about three years.
of two cells in series, said Heeger. The deposition of each layer of
the multilayer structure by processing the materials from solution is
what promises to make the solar cells less expensive to produce.
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