Results: A device built by researchers at Stanford Uni-versity converts both the light and the heat in the sun's radia-tion into an electrical current.Why It Matters: Con-ventional solar cells can use only a narrow band of the sun's energy; the rest of the spectrum is lost as heat. The most common type of silicon solar cells convert 15 per-cent of the energy in sunlight into electricity. But Stanford researchers realized that the light in solar radiation could also enhance the performance of a device called a therm-ionic energy converter, which usually uses only heat. They say that such devices could in theory convert solar energy with 50 percent efficiency.
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