Researchers Printed Energy Producing Photographs

Picture/Text Can be Inkjet Printed as Solar Cell

Manufacture of solar cells have been done for a long time from economical substances with various printing procedures and biological solar cells and dye sensitized solar cells in particular have been appropriate for printing. A solar cell that comprises of both solar as well as non-solar sources of light like photons from incandescent bulbs is said to be a photovoltaic cell. Essentially the strategies requires to satisfy two roles namely photogeneration of charge carriers – electrons and holes, in a light captivating substance and separation of the charge carriers to a conductive contact which tends to transmit the electricity.

The conversion is said to be the photovoltaic effect and the arena of research linked to solar cells is called photovoltaic. With the process established in Aalto University,researchers have invented a system where any text or photograph could be printed as a solar cell. As per Aalto University News website, Janne Halme, University Lecturer commented that they wanted to take the idea of printed solar cells further and see if the materials could be inkjet-printed as pictures and text like traditional printing inks. Utilising the latest technologically advanced expertise, any picture or text can be inkjet-printed as a solar cell and when light is captivated in an ordinary ink, it causes heat.

Darker the Colour, More Electricity Produced

Photovoltaic ink though coverts a portion of that energy into electricity and the darker the colour, the more electricity tends to get produced since the human eye is said to be sensitive to that area of the solar radiation spectrum that has the maximum energy density. The most effective solar cell is thus pitch-black. The purpose of a colourful patterned solar is to combine the other properties which tend to take the benefit of light on the same surface like in the case of visual information and graphics.

For instance, this kind of solar cell, installed on an adequately low-powerelectrical device, could be a part of its visual design while simultaneously create the required energy, contemplates Halme. In the case of inkjet printing, the photovoltaic dye can be printed to a shape determined for a selected image file and could be adapted precisely with the darkness and transparency of the various sections of the image.

Postdoctoral Researcher Ghufran Hashmi has commented stating that `the inkjet-dyed solar cells were as effective and long-lasting as the corresponding solar cells prepared in a traditional way and endured more than one thousand hours of constant light and heat stress without signs of performance degradations’.

Progress of Decorative Product Building Integrated Solar Cells

The electrolyte and dye which seemed to be the best had been obtained from the research group in the Swiss Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, the place where Dr Hashmi had worked as a visiting researcher. Doctoral Candidate Merve Ozkan informs that the most challenging thing was to obtain appropriate solvent for the dye and the right jetting parameters which gave accurate and uniform print quality.

The results of the research have given rise to new possibilities for the progress of decorative product-building-integrated solar cells. The results had been published in the Energy & Environmental Science, the most renowned journal in energy research. The research had been financed mostly by the Academy of Finland and the SELECT + Erasmus Mundus Joint Doctoral Programme of the European Union.