Solar : Science World Report

Dec 23, 2013 08:32 AM EST

Solar Activity is Not Key to Climate Change: Sun Doesn't Impact Temperature

Solar activity was once thought to influence climate. In fact, some scientists have speculated that it might have helped impact current changing temperatures. Now, though, researchers have shown that this isn't the case; climate change has not been strongly influenced by variations in heat from the ...

Jul 09, 2013 05:31 PM EDT

Solar Impulse Concludes Across America Trip in NYC and Rings NASDAQ Bell

In a leap towards flying around the world using solar power alone, Solar Impulse landed in New York this weekend – an important landmark for the Swiss project.

May 21, 2013 11:33 PM EDT

The Future of Our Sun

A newly discovered solar twin star allows astronomers to refine the expected development path of our Sun. The time that remains until the Sun will become too hot for liquid water on Earth will be about 2 billion years, the researchers say.

May 03, 2013 11:44 AM EDT

Graphene 'Paint' Could Power Future Homes with Solar Energy

A new material made of graphene could, in theory, be "painted" onto outside walls to absorb solar energy and power the homes of the future.

May 01, 2013 12:00 AM EDT

Ultra-Efficient and Cheap Solar System Enabled by Microchannel Cooling

To develop an affordable photovoltaic system capable of concentrating solar radiation 2,000 times and converting 80 percent of the incoming radiation into useful energy, the Swiss Commission for Technology and Innovation has awarded Swiss scientists a $2.4 million (2.25 million CHF) grant

Mar 28, 2013 05:33 PM EDT

Solar Impulse Electric Plane Will Fly Across America

The experimental solar-powered plane Solar Impulse, created by Swiss inventors Bertrand Piccard and André Borschberg ,is reportedly headed for the United States where it will fly coast-to-coast. The "Across America" tour lifts off in May, says a report in the Huffington Post.

Mar 20, 2013 07:19 PM EDT

Voyager Exits Solar System. Really? Not so Fast

The American Geophysical Union published an article on Wednesday which boldly announced that the Voyager 1 had left our Solar System.

Mar 05, 2013 06:11 PM EST

Super Effective Camera Chips And Solar Cells Possible With Graphene

Theoretically expected, it was now experimentally proven by scientists for the first time that the fascinating new material graphene is also highly efficient at converting light into electricity--which makes it an ideal candidate to boost the sensitivity of imaging sensors and also to increase the m...

Feb 25, 2013 04:49 PM EST

Organic Solar Cell Marks World Record Efficiency For The 3rd-Gen Tech

Organic photovoltaics represent the third generation in the field of PV technology, similar to the organic display and lighting revolutions, and will enable flexible, beautiful, cheap, ubiquitous applications of the cells in the medium- to long-term.

Feb 14, 2013 01:00 PM EST

New World-Record for Low-Cost Thin-Film Solar Cell Efficiency

Photovoltaic modules will be the same price as ordinary roof tiles now with the EPFL’s Institute of Microengineering reaching a remarkable 10.7% efficiency for a single-junction micro-crystalline silicon solar cell, surpassing the previous world record of 10.1% held by the Japanese company Kaneka ...

Dec 26, 2012 05:25 PM EST

Low-cost, transparent, flexible nanowire hybrid solar cells

A new kind of photovoltaic cell based on sheets of flexible graphene coated with a layer of nanowires have been produced for the first time by MIT researchers, but a caveat is lower efficiency in first examples.