Better Materials Mean Better Solar Cells
Innovation in materials research is revealing a future in which solar power is inexpensive and efficient, and sunlight-harvesting thin films cover everything from airplanes to buildings. Crystalline silicon, or c-Si, is the dominant photon-absorbing material in conventional solar cell technology; it made up nearly 90 percent of the modules produced globally in 2012. Although no other material comes close to replacing plentiful, inexpensive c-Si – thin film is a distant second – th...
Photonics Spectra, September 2013