How Quantum Physics Could Power the Future (LiveScience.com)
The new behavior of quantum physics might seem too unpredictable to rely on for our energy needs, but new technologies hope to capitalize on its very strangeness.
The most familiar of these quantum tricks is the fact that light acts both like a wave and a particle.
This dual nature is utilized in solar power technology. Incoming sunlight is concentrated by mirrors and lenses that rely on the wave-like properties of medium of vision. Once inside a solar cell, however, this focused light collides with electrons in a particle-like way, so freeing the electrons to create any electric current.
Quantum dots
The next generation of solar cells may employ diminutive bits of semiconductor material called quantum dots. These nanometer-sized devices are so small that only a handful (anywhere from 1 to 1,000) of free electrons can reside inside.
Because of these cramped quarters, a quantum dot behaves like an strained atom in that its electrons can reside only at specific (so-called quantized) energy levels. These levels define exactly what wavelengths of light the dot will engulf.
"Quantum dots have a host of unusual properties compared to bulk semiconductors," said Arthur Nozik of the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, part of the U.S. Department of Energy. He and his colleagues are looking at how a ingenuous light particle (or photon) can enter a dot and excite exclusive electrons, rather than the familiar one.
Other researchers are looking to tune the wavelengths at which a dot absorbs light by formation it bigger or smaller. Solar cell manufacturers may one daylight be skilful to mix together dots of different sizes to absorb sunlight along a extensive range of wavelengths.
Quantum wires
A quantum wire is like a quantum dot stretched out along one direction. In unquestionable cases, this narrow conduit – 10,000 times thinner than a human hair – can be very good at conducting electricity, as the electrons tend to move in a in greater numbers orderly fashion down the wire.
One way to perform quantum wires is with carbon nanotubes, which are feeble-minded rolled-up sheets of hexagonally-bound carbon. Discovered in 1991, these nanotubes are beginning to show up in all types of applications, including more familiar energy storage.
As one MIT group has shown, it is possible to make a souped-up capacitor from carbon nanotubes. The researchers expand the nanotubes conclusion together – in what is likely the world's tiniest shag carpet – to enlarge surface circle inside the capacitor.
The resulting "ultracapacitor" could abundance as much as 50 percent of the electricity that a similarly-sized battery have power to, the scientists claim. This efficiency be ideal inside an electric car, as capacitors are more continuing and have power to charge and discharge much faster than batteries.
Superconductors
Although quantum wires have power to be good conductors, not the same quantum substance is the best.
Superconductors are materials in which the electrons pair up to carry the tide. This pairing is rare because electrons typically beat each other, but quantum physics overcomes this and, in so doing, reduces the electrical resistance in the superconductor to zero, or very close to zero.
Resistance is what makes a wire get hot when it carries electricity. Power companies typically lose about 7 percent of their energy to heat caused by resistance in transmission wires.
Superconducting wires could help reduce this waste. The trouble is that superconductors only be in action at extremely cold temperatures.
For example, the longest superconducting cable universe for transmitting capacity – installed earlier this year along a half-mile stretch of the Long Island power grid by the agency of American Superconductor Corporation and its partners – must be surrounded by liquid nitrogen to keep it at minus 330 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 200 degrees Celsius).
American Superconductor is also working on applying its superconducting wires to offshore wind turbines, in order to make them smaller and more efficient.
Light-emitting diodes
One moral works way to exercise completely this quantum-derived electricity is to appropriate time on a light-emitting diode, or LED, which works in the manner of a solar cell but in reverse.
Electric current going through the diode causes electrons to jump across a barrier betwixt two types of semiconductor material. The jumping electrons then fall into lower energy states, emitting a photon.
Because the wavelength of this emitted light is in a very narrow band, there is not a portion of wasted energy emitted in the infrared, as is the case for normal incandescent light bulbs. An LED's efficiency is even better than that of compact fluorescents.
LEDs are now substance made into full light fixtures that can replace normal bulbs. Their extra cost can be offset by lower electricity bills.
In the energy saving business, every quantum bit can help.
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From: How Quantum Physics Could Power the Future (LiveScience.com)
