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Many industries, such as solar cells and energy storage, will be greatly benefited by high-gain step-up/step-down converters.UCI researchers have developed a family of hybrid boosting converters (HBC) that combine a base bipolar voltage multiplier (BVM) and one of several possible inductive switching cores to address various converter functionalities.

Switched capacitor converters, which provide high-gain voltage conversion, have drawbacks that have limited their use to specific applications. UCI researchers have developed a family of two-switch boosting switched-capacitor converters (TBSC) that enables the use of switched-capacitor converters in low cost and small-size applications as well as on-chip integration.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering have developed a novel multi-point, multi-access thermal energy storage system.

Researchers at the University of California, Davis and Carnegie Mellon University have developed a new design and fabrication method for high pressure heat exchangers (HX) using additive manufacturing (AM). This method would allow for the creation of primary heat exchanger (PHX) systems with minimal energy loss.

   Researchers at UCI have, for the first time, developed a method for modeling the efficiencies of artificial photosynthetic devices containing multiple light absorbers. As these devices more closely parallel naturally occurring photosynthesis, they offer higher performance than standard single-absorber devices.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Chemistry & Biochemistry have developed an approach for synthesizing nitrogen-containing polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons with high yield.

Researchers at UCLA have developed an underground drilled shaft concept for storage of hydrogen or other gases.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed Perovskite/Cu(In, Ga)Se2 (PVSK/CIGS) tandem photovoltaic devices with ~22% efficiency.

UCLA researchers in the department of Materials Science & Engineering have discovered a novel Lewis base additive that decreases heterogeneity in perovskite thin films.

Researchers at UCI have developed a compact device for the rapid desalination of water which is driven entirely by renewable solar energy.

Silicon photovoltaic (“Si-PV”) modules currently dominate the solar energy market. Increased progress into Si-PV efficiency enhancements combined with historically low module costs aim to decrease the overall Levelized Cost of Electricity (“LCOE”) to a point competitive with non-renewable energy sources. Despite recent LCOE reductions, Si-PV technology remains economically inferior to fossil fuels. Additionally, flat-plate Si solar modules generally require geographical locations with high direct normal incidence (“DNI”) sunlight conditions in order to maintain module performance. Both the strict DNI requirement and the high LCOE of Si-PV cells ultimately limit the dissemination of solar power into the global energy market. A solution for the capturing of diffuse sunlight includes the use of optical concentrators.  One class of optical concentrators includes luminescent solar concentrators (“LSCs”).  Luminescent solar concentrators have garnered interest due to their ability to utilize diffuse light and their potential for use in architectural applications such as large area power-generating windows. However, LSCs have not yet reached commercialization for photovoltaic power generation, largely due to their comparatively low power conversion efficiencies (“PCEs”) and lack of scalability.     Researchers at UC Berkeley and other educational institutions have developed luminescent solar concentrators that  can be designed to minimize photon thermalization losses and incomplete light trapping using various novel components and techniques.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Electrical Engineering have invented a novel graphene-polymer nanocomposite material for flexible transparent conductive electrode (TCE) applications.

Reducing reflection from surfaces is very important for improving the efficiency of solar cells and photodetectors, producing improved optical displays with less glare as well as coatings for high power optical applications. Without anti-reflection (AR), semiconductor surfaces reflect 30-40% of incident light and glass reflects 10-20% even at normal incidence and >70% with large incident angles.  Traditional methods for achieving anti-reflection are through thin film AR coating. The traditional AR coating is designed to be a quarter-wavelength in thickness (typically 50-100 nm) and has refractive index equal to the geometric mean of the two refractive indices of the media between which antireflection is desired. Antireflection is achieved using destructive interference and is necessarily a narrow-band and narrow-angle effect. The anti-reflective performance deteriorates as incidence angle increases and is particularly severe beyond 40-50 degrees. This is a major issue in the presence of diffuse light, which is the case in any realistic environment.  Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley have developed a novel  Nanocone Metasurface that is able to address what AR coating is unable to do at high incident angles. This method significantly augments the properties of a traditional thin film AR coating. A nanocone array is made of silicon nitride sitting on a thin silicon nitride layer. This underlying layer is similar to a traditional thin film AR coating. Underneath the nanocone metasurface is a indium gallium phosphide absorber. The nanocone metasurface serves as an omni-directional anti-reflection coating thereby collecting light from all directions.

The invention is a specialized membrane that absorbs solar energy to directly drive desalination of salt water. Compared to state of the art devices, the invention is capable of bypassing the inefficient conversion from electronic energy to ionic energy, saving up to 85% of the energy required by other state of the art electrodialysis cells.

Researchers at the University of California, Davis have developed a novel design for a solar power converter. The system uses an efficient selective absorber to harvest solar radiation.

Researchers at the University of California, Davis have developed a novel method of desalination without an external power source.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed a novel transparent and flexible electrode material for optoelectronic device applications.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed a novel lead halide perovskite solar cell with a metal oxide charge transport layer.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed a novel hybrid organic-inorganic solar cell that has a power conversion efficiency of ~10.5%.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed novel tandem transparent and semi-transparent organic photovoltaic (OPV) devices.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed a novel composite material made of metal oxide nanoparticles (NPs) and silver nanowires (AgNWs).

UCLA researchers in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering have developed a novel class of conjugated polymers for photo-electronic device applications.

Surface defects dominate the behavior of minority carriers in semiconductors and optoelectronic devices. Photoluminescence quantum yield (QY), which dictates efficiency of optoelectrics such as LEDs, lasers, and solar cells, is extremely low in materials with a large number of surface defects. Researchers at UC Berkeley and Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory have developed a bis(trifluoromethane) sulfonamide (TFSI) solution for passivation/repair of surface defects in 2D transition metal dichalcogenide (TMDC). This air-stable solution-based chemical treatment provides unmatched photoluminescence QY enhancement to values near 100% without changing the surface morphology. The treatment eliminates defect-mediated non-radiative recombination, which eliminates the low performance limit of TMDC and enhances its minority carrier lifetime. This novel development can address surface passivation in numerous semiconductors which will lead to highly efficient light emitting diodes, lasers and solar cells based on 2D materials.

Background: Solar resources are at a premium and the solar energy industry is a $130B market with growth projects of 30%. High demands for attaining renewable energy efficiently and cost-effectively, along with government incentives, are all good indicators for finding innovative ways to optimize solar energy systems.  Brief Description: Traditional semiconducting materials, i.e. silicon and cadmium telluride are unable to absorb all wavelengths of light and become usable energy. UCR researchers were able to functionalize semiconducting nanocrystals that are very efficient in upconverting near infrared photons into higher energy photons. They have optimized upconversion through carefully formulated combinations of semiconductor nanocrystals and organic ligands to enhance upconversion emission by up to 3 orders of magnitude relative to nanocrystals alone. This provides a way to enhance the efficiency of photovoltaic cells and reduce solar electricity costs.