More efficient solar cells are developed

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C., Nov. 7 (UPI) -- Wake Forest University scientists say they have made significant strides in improving the efficiency of organic, or flexible, solar cells.

Traditional silicon solar panels are heavy and bulky and convert about 20 percent of the light that hits them into useful electrical power. For years, researchers have worked to create organic solar cells that can be wrapped around surfaces, rolled up or even painted onto structures. However, the best scientists have been able to develop is about 3 percent efficiency.

But now scientists at Wake Forest's Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials, with help from researchers at New Mexico State University, have achieved an efficiency of nearly 6 percent.

In order to be considered a viable technology, solar cells must be able to convert at least 10 percent of the energy in sunlight to electricity. Wake Forest researchers hope to reach 10 percent by October 2006, said David Carroll, director of the nanotechnology center at Wake Forest.

Carroll said flexible, organic solar cells would offer several possibilities for military, recreational and commercial use.

The breakthrough was announced last month at the Santa Fe Workshop on Nanoengineered Materials and Macro-Molecular Technologies, sponsored by Wake Forest's nanotechnology center.