Solar cells for underwater use developed
WASHINGTON, Jun 7, 2012 -- UPI
U.S. researches say they've developed solar cells capable of
producing sufficient power underwater to operate electronic
sensor systems at depths of 30 feet.
Scientists at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory in
Washington, said underwater autonomous systems and sensor
platforms are severely limited by the lack of power sources,
having to rely on on-shore power, batteries or solar power
supplied by an above-water platform.
Attempts to use photovoltaic solar cells have had limited
success due to the lack of penetrating sunlight, as most current
solar cells are optimized to use the terrestrial solar spectrum,
they said.
"Although water absorbs sunlight, the technical challenge is
to develop a solar cell that can efficiently convert these
underwater photons to electricity," Phillip Jenkins of the NRL
Imagers and Detectors Section said.
The filtered spectrum of the sun underwater is biased toward
the blue/green portion of the spectrum, researchers said,
requiring solar cells well matched to the wavelength range.
Using high-quality gallium indium phosphide cells,
researchers said they've managed outputs of 7 watts per square
meter, sufficient to harvest useful solar power at depths
commonly found in nearshore zones.
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