Solar cells currently in use are mostly silicon-based, but their efficiency is limited. This has led researchers to explore new materials.

Researchers at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg (MLU) have discovered a new method to increase the efficiency of solar cells by a factor of 1,000. The team of scientists achieved this breakthrough by creating crystalline layers of barium titanate, strontium titanate, and calcium titanate, which were alternately placed on top of one another in a lattice structure.

  • UpperBroccoli@lemmy.blahaj.zone
    551·
    4 months ago

    That article - and especially the title - seem misleading. To quote (emphasis mine):

    The result surprised even the research group: compared to pure barium titanate of a similar thickness, the current flow was up to 1,000 times stronger, despite the fact that the proportion of barium titanate as the main photoelectric component was reduced by almost two thirds.

    I am sure this is exciting and very important research though.

    • n3m37h
      123·
      4 months ago

      And this is the next paragraph

      Bhatnagar explained, “The interaction between the lattice layers appears to lead to a much higher permittivity - in other words, the electrons are able to flow much more easily due to the excitation by the light photons.” The measurements also showed that this effect is very robust: it remained nearly constant over a six-month period.

      I don’t get why ya think anything here is misleading

      Its like burning magnesium oxide alone vs magnesium oxide+iron oxide. Yeah they both burn but one produces 1000x more heat

      • RvTV95XBeo
        22·
        4 months ago

        Because the title says “1000x more powerful than existing panels”. The article clarifies that this is existing barium panels, but the title (I would argue misleadingly so) does not clarify that they aren’t referring to existing silicone solar panels.

        Especially misleading because of the use of the word “existing” because it sounds like they’re referring to something that has made it out of a lab, but I’d wager 99.99999+% of people have never seen an “existing” barium solar panel.

        A less misleading title would be something like:

        Experimental barium solar panel 10000x more efficient than past attempts, possibility of performance parity with silicon in sight

        Or some such nonsense. You could move the second half to a subtitle and still be much clearer and less misleading than the original in title alone.