Solar panel smartphones

We’ve heard of ordinary houses being transformed into solar-friendly homes with the installation of solar panels, but what we haven’t seen yet is a smartphone with the ability to capture light from the sun. The idea is brilliant and makes the average person wonder why they didn’t think of it sooner. Combine the phone addiction, the lack of outlets when on the go, and the desire to go green and eco-friendly, and you get the perfect new invention.

A team of researchers at UCLA has created a two-layer, completely transparent solar film that works just like a solar panel. 

The film absorbs the sun and converts it into power to charge your phone. The solar film looks like a transparent sticker and is made to harvest 80% infrared light from the sun. If two layers of film are combined back to back, they can gain twice as much energy as the original one. Head researcher Yang Yang commented on the combination saying, “Using two solar cells with the new interfacial materials in between produces close to two times the energy we originally observed.”

UCLA claims that its panels can translate 7.3% of energy it receives into efficient energy that can later be used to give your phone an extra charge. Regular solar panels use 12% to 15% of its energy, so the difference is not as large as expected, given the size.

The creators of the solar film believe that this will only increase the use of solar energy and allow panels to be installed in more locations on various objects. MIT has supported the idea and researchers are starting to create transparent film of their own. As soon as this idea hits the market it’s expected to be cost friendly and easy to apply.

The non-intrusive solar film will not only be used to stick onto smartphones, but it can also sit on the wing of a plane or transparent windows of an office building or the sunroof of a car to capture as much energy as possible. The researchers hope that once their invention goes main stream it will be sold with smartphones. There is no official date set up for public release at this time.