Solar

Dec 6 2011

Giant super-Earths made of diamond are possible, study suggests

ScienceDaily (Dec. 5, 2011) — A planet made of diamonds may sound lovely, but you wouldn’t want to live there.

A new study suggests that some stars in the Milky Way could harbor “carbon super-Earths” — giant terrestrial planets that contain up to 50 percent diamond.

But if they exist, those planets are likely devoid of life as we know it.

The finding comes from a laboratory experiment at Ohio State University, where researchers recreated the temperatures and pressures of Earth’s lower mantle to study how diamonds form there.

The larger goal was to understand what happens to carbon inside planets in other solar systems, and whether solar systems that are rich in carbon could produce planets that are mostly made of diamond.

Wendy Panero, associate professor in the School of Earth Sciences at Ohio State, and doctoral student Cayman Unterborn used what they learned from the experiments to construct computer models of the minerals that form in planets composed with more carbon than Earth.

The result: “It’s possible for planets that are as big as fifteen times the mass of the Earth to be half made of diamond,” Unterborn said. He presented the study Tuesday at the American Geophysical Union meeting in San Francisco.

“Our results are striking, in that they suggest carbon-rich planets can form with a core and a mantle, just as Earth did,” Panero added. “However, the cores would likely be very carbon-rich — much like steel — and the mantle would also be dominated by carbon, much in the form of diamond.”

Earth’s core is mostly iron, she explained, and the mantle mostly silica-based minerals, a result of the elements that were present in the dust cloud that formed into our solar system. Planets that form in carbon-rich solar systems would have to follow a different chemical recipe — with direct consequences for the potential for life.

Earth’s hot interior results in geothermal energy, making our planet hospitable.

Diamonds transfer heat so readily, however, that a carbon super-Earth’s interior would quickly freeze. That means no geothermal energy, no plate tectonics, and — ultimately — no magnetic field or atmosphere.

“We think a diamond planet must be a very cold, dark place,” Panero said.

She and former graduate student Jason Kabbes subjected a tiny sample of iron, carbon, and oxygen to pressures of 65 gigapascals and temperatures of 2,400 Kelvin (close to 9.5 million pounds per square inch and 3,800 degrees Fahrenheit — conditions similar to the Earth’s deep interior).

As they watched under the microscope, the oxygen bonded with the iron, creating iron oxide — a type of rust — and left behind pockets of pure carbon, which became diamond.

Based on the data from that test, the researchers made computer models of Earth’s interior, and verified what geologists have long suspected — that a diamond-rich layer likely exists in Earth’s lower mantle, just above the core.

That result wasn’t surprising. But when they modeled what would happen when these results were applied to the composition of a carbon super-Earth, they found that the planet could become very large, with iron and carbon merged to form a kind of carbon steel in the core, and vast quantities of pure carbon in the mantle in the form of diamond.

The researchers discussed the implications for planetary science.

“To date, more than five hundred planets have been discovered outside of our solar system, yet we know very little about their internal compositions,” said Unterborn, who is an astronomer by training.

“We’re looking at how volatile elements like hydrogen and carbon interact inside the Earth, because when they bond with oxygen, you get atmospheres, you get oceans — you get life,” Panero said. “The ultimate goal is to compile a suite of conditions that are necessary for an ocean to form on a planet.”

This work contrasts with the recent discovery by an unrelated team of researchers who found a so-called “diamond planet” which is actually the remnant of a dead star in a binary system.

The Ohio State research suggests that true terrestrial diamond planets can form in our galaxy. Exactly how many such planets might be out there and their possible internal composition is an open question — one that Unterborn is pursuing with Ohio State astronomer Jennifer Johnson.

This research was funded by Panero’s CAREER award from the National Science Foundation.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Ohio State University. The original article was written by Pam Frost Gorder.

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Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/12/111205140531.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power

Nov 3 2011

Astrobiologists discover ‘sweet spots’ for the formation of complex organic molecules in the galaxy

ScienceDaily (Nov. 2, 2011) — Scientists within the New York Center for Astrobiology at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have compiled years of research to help locate areas in outer space that have extreme potential for complex organic molecule formation. The scientists searched for methanol, a key ingredient in the synthesis of organic molecules that could lead to life. Their results have implications for determining the origins of molecules that spark life in the cosmos.

The findings will be published in the Nov. 20 edition of The Astrophysical Journal in a paper titled “Observational constraints on methanol production in interstellar and preplanetary ices.” The work is collaboration between researchers at Rensselaer, NASA Ames Research Center, the SETI Institute, and Ohio State University.

“Methanol formation is the major chemical pathway to complex organic molecules in interstellar space,” said the lead researcher of the study and director of the NASA-funded center, Douglas Whittet of Rensselaer. If scientists can identify regions where conditions are right for rich methanol production, they will be better able to understand where and how the complex organic molecules needed to create life are formed. In other words, follow the methanol and you may be able to follow the chemistry that leads to life.

Using powerful telescopes on Earth, scientists have observed large concentrations of simple molecules such as carbon monoxide in the clouds that give birth to new stars. In order to make more complex organic molecules, hydrogen needs to enter the chemical process. The best way for this chemistry to occur is on the surfaces of tiny dust grains in space, according to Whittet. In the right conditions, carbon monoxide on the surface of interstellar dust can react at low temperatures with hydrogen to create methanol (CH₃OH). Methanol then serves as an important steppingstone to formation of the much more complex organic molecules that are required to create life. Scientists have known that methanol is out there, but to date there has been limited detail on where it is most readily produced.

What Whittet and his collaborators have discovered is that methanol is most abundant around a very small number of newly formed stars. Not all young stars reach such potential for organic chemistry. In fact, the range in methanol concentration varies from negligible amounts in some regions of the interstellar medium to approximately 30 percent of the ices around a handful of newly formed stars. They also discovered methanol for the first time in low concentrations (1 to 2 percent) in the cold clouds that will eventually give birth to new stars.

The scientists conclude in the paper that there is a “sweet spot” in the physical conditions surrounding some stars that accounts for the large discrepancy in methanol formation in the galaxy. The complexity of the chemistry depends on how fast certain molecules reach the dust grains surrounding new stars, according the Whittet. The rate of molecule accumulation on the particles can result in an organic boom or a literal dead end.

“If the carbon monoxide molecules build up too quickly on the surfaces of the dust grains, they don’t get the opportunity to react and form more complex molecules. Instead, the molecules get buried in the ices and add up to a lot of dead weight,” Whittet said. “If the buildup is too slow, the opportunities for reaction are also much lower.”

This means that under the right conditions, the dust surrounding certain stars could hold greater potential for life than most of its siblings. The presence of high concentrations of methanol could essentially jumpstart the process to create life on the planets formed around certain stars.

The scientists also compared their results with methanol concentrations in comets to determine a baseline of methanol production in our own solar system.

“Comets are time capsules,” Whittet said. “Comets can preserve the early history of our solar system because they contain material that hasn’t changed since the solar system was formed.” As such, the scientists could look at the concentrations of methanol in comets to determine the amount of methanol that was in our solar system at its birth.

What they found was that methanol concentrations at the birth of our solar system were actually closer to the average of what they saw elsewhere in interstellar space. Methanol concentrations in our solar system were fairly low, at only a few percent, compared to some of the other methanol-dense areas in the galaxy observed by Whittet and his colleagues.

“This means that our solar system wasn’t particularly lucky and didn’t have the large amounts of methanol that we see around some other stars in the galaxy,” Whittet said.

“But, it was obviously enough for us to be here.”

The results suggest that there could be solar systems out there that were even luckier in the biological game than we were, according to Whittet. As we look deeper into the cosmos, we may eventually be able to determine what a solar system bursting with methanol can do.

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The above story is reprinted from materials provided by Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

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Journal Reference:

1. D. C. B. Whittet, A. M. Cook, Eric Herbst, J. E. Chiar, S. S. Shenoy. Observational constraints on methanol production in interstellar and preplanetary ices. The Astrophysical Journal, 2011; 742 (1): 28 DOI: 10.1088/0004-637X/742/1/28

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Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/11/111102190028.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power

Oct 15 2011

Mobile electrons multiplied in quantum dot films

ScienceDaily (Oct. 14, 2011) — Researchers of the Opto-electronic Materials section of the TU Delft and Toyota Europe have demonstrated that several mobile electrons can be produced by the absorption of a single light particle in films of coupled quantum dots. These multiple electrons can be harvested in solar cells with increased efficiency.

The researchers published their findings in the October issue of the scientific journal Nano Letters.

A way to increase the efficiency of cheap solar cells is the use of semiconductor nanoparticles, also called quantum dots. In theory, the efficiency of these cells can be increased to 44%. This is due to an interesting effect that efficiently happens in these nanoparticles: carrier multiplication. In the current solar cells, an absorbed light particle can only excite one electron, while in a quantum dot solar cell a light particle can excite several electrons. Multiplying the number of electrons results in the enhancement of current in solar cells, increasing the overall power conversion efficiency.

Carrier Multiplication

Several years ago it was demonstrated that carrier multiplication is more efficient in quantum dots than in traditional semiconductors. As a result, these quantum dots are currently heavily investigated worldwide for use in solar cells. A problem with using carrier multiplication is that the produced charges live only a very short time (around 0.00000000005 s) before they collide with each other and disappear via a decay process known as Auger recombination. The main current challenge is to proof that it is still possible to do something useful with them.

Mobile charges

The researchers from Delft have now demonstrated that even this very short time is long enough to separate the multiple electrons from each other. They prepared films of quantum dots in which the electrons can move so efficiently between the quantum dots that they become free and mobile before the time it takes to disappear via Auger recombination. In these films up to 3.5 free electrons are created per absorbed light particle. In this way, these electrons do not only survive, they are able to move freely through the material to be available for collection in a solar cell.

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by Delft University of Technology.

Journal Reference:

1. Michiel Aerts, C. S. Suchand Sandeep, Yunan Gao, Tom J. Savenije, Juleon M. Schins, Arjan J. Houtepen, Sachin Kinge, Laurens D. A. Siebbeles. Free Charges Produced by Carrier Multiplication in Strongly Coupled PbSe Quantum Dot Films. Nano Letters, 2011; 11 (10): 4485 DOI: 10.1021/nl202915p

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Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111014080041.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power

Oct 13 2011

Cheaper yet efficient thin film solar cells created

ScienceDaily (Oct. 12, 2011) — Researchers in Singapore have exploited advanced nanostructure technology to make a highly efficient and yet cheaper silicon solar cell. With this development, the researchers hope that the cost of solar energy can be halved.

Developed jointly by Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and A*STAR Institute of Microelectronics (IME), the new thin-film silicon solar cells are designed to be made from cheaper, low grade silicon. However it is able to generate electricity currents close to that produced by traditional solar cells made from costly, high quality silicon.

The new NTU-A*STAR nano-structured solar cells can produce a current of (34.3mA/cm2) — a world record for a silicon solar cell of its kind.

This is made possible by creating a unique texture using nanostructures — which is thousands of times smaller than human hair — on the surface of the solar cell.

The resulting electricity current output is close to those of traditional cells (40mA/cm2). Conventional thin film solar cells usually produce about half of the current that traditional cells produce.

Adoption of solar energy around the world is hindered by the high cost of traditional solar panels, partially due to it being made from high grade crystalline bulk silicon.

Using low-grade amorphous (shapeless) silicon thin film that has no texture — which is over 100 times thinner — addresses the material cost issue, but it is not as effective in converting sunlight to electricity, thus producing less energy.

The newly developed nanostructure method, which creates a unique texture on the surface of amorphous silicon, improves the Power Conversion Efficiency (PCE) of the thin film silicon cell and so increases the energy output.

The lead of the project from IME, Dr Navab Singh, Senior Scientist of IME’s NanoElectronics Programme, said: “To mitigate against reduced light absorption and carrier recombination in the amorphous silicon thin film cells, we designed and fabricated the novel nanostructures on silicon surface. The sole application of IME’s surface texturing strategy achieved a record high of short circuit current density with 5.26% PCE.”

“The cell level power conversion efficiencies of bulk crystalline Si solar cells are 20 — 25%. Given that short circuit current density is directly proportional to PCE, it is conceivable that subsequent efforts to improve fill factor and open circuit voltage would boost the final PCE of the silicon thin film solar cells greatly to match that of bulk Si solar cells. Our future research efforts will explore additional light trapping strategies such as plasmonics,” continued Dr Singh.

Professor Cheng Tee Hiang, Chair of the School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, said improving the efficiency of low-cost solar cells is critical in encouraging adoption of solar energy around the world.

“Today’s world is faced with several challenges, which include the depletion of fossil fuels, increased cost of such fuels and a growing carbon footprint. At NTU, we are committed to develop the next generation of solar cells which are cheap, efficient and easy to manufacture, so as to enable solar energy to play a bigger role as a renewable resource.”

Sustainability is one of NTU’s Five Peaks of Excellence which the university aims to make its mark globally under NTU 2015 five year strategic plan. The other four peaks include future healthcare, new media, the best of the East and West, and innovation.

Professor Dim-Lee Kwong, Executive Director of IME, said, “The demand for thin film solar cells are expected to double by 2013. IME’s research efforts in this area are congruent with the world-wide movement towards renewable pro-environment and cost-viable energy solutions.”

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by Nanyang Technological University.

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Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111012113349.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power

Oct 11 2011

Measuring elusive solar neutrinos flowing through the Earth, physicists learn more about the sun

ScienceDaily (Oct. 7, 2011) — Using one of the most sensitive neutrino detectors on the planet, an international team including physicists Laura Cadonati and Andrea Pocar at the University of Massachusetts Amherst are now measuring the flow of solar neutrinos reaching earth more precisely than ever before. The detector probes matter at the most fundamental level and provides a powerful tool for directly observing the sun’s composition.

Pocar, Cadonati and colleagues report in the current issue of Physical Review Letters that the Borexino instrument has now measured with high precision the flux of the beryllium seven (⁷Be) solar neutrino, abundant, low-energy particles once below the observable threshold. With this advance, they can now precisely study the behavior of solar neutrinos with kinetic energy below 1 megaelectron volt (MeV). Borexino scientists also recently reported the first observation of neutrinos produced in a little-studied solar nuclear process known as proton-electron-proton, or pep, and set of stringent limit on reactions involving carbon, nitrogen and oxygen (the CNO cycle) in the sun.

Cadonati says, “Borexino is the only detector capable of observing the entire spectrum of solar neutrinos at once. Our results, the culmination of 20 years of research, greatly narrow the observation precision. The data confirm the neutrino oscillations, flavor changes and flow predicted by models of the sun and particle physics.”

Of particular interest, Pocar and Cadonati note, is the Borexino instrument’s ability to more thoroughly test neutrino oscillation parameters, allowing an exploration of their characteristic non-zero mass, which does not fit the Standard Model of particle physics. “Our data can tell us about fundamental micro physics at the particle level,” says Cadonati. “Borexino is using neutrinos to explore the interior of the sun, looking for new, exciting clues to the mysteries of the universe we cannot see.” Pocar adds, “Our detector provides stringent tests of the three-neutrino oscillations model.”

Solar neutrinos are produced in nuclear processes and radioactive decays of several elements during fusion reactions at the sun’s core. As many as 65 billion of them stream out of the sun and hit every square centimeter of Earth’s surface [or 420 billion every square inch] every second. But because they only interact through the nuclear weak force they pass through matter unaffected, making them very difficult to detect and to distinguish from the trace nuclear decays of ordinary materials. The weak force is one of the four fundamental forces of nature, with gravity, electromagnetism and the strong force. It is responsible for the radioactive decay of unstable subatomic particles, with a short range of influence, about 1 percent of the diameter of a typical atomic nucleus.

The Borexino instrument, housed far beneath Italy’s Apennine Mountains, detects neutrinos as they interact with an ultra-pure organic liquid scintillator at the center of a large sphere surrounded by 2,000 tons of water. Its great depth and many onion-like protective layers maintain the core as the most radiation-free medium on the planet.

There are three neutrino types, or “flavors”: electron, muon and tau. Those produced in the sun are the electron type. As they travel away from their birthplace, they oscillate, or change from one flavor to another. A detector like Borexino can observe all three types in real time and measures each one’s energy, but it cannot distinguish between them. It’s more sensitive to the electron type so they are more likely to be seen.

The ⁷Be neutrino flux now being detected by Borexino is predicted by the standard solar model to make up about 10 percent of solar flow, Cadonati says. Earlier instruments in Canada and Japan designed to detect higher-energy neutrinos had already observed evidence of their flavor oscillations, probing 1/10,000 of the solar neutrino flux and their oscillations as they travel through solar matter. However, without data in the low-energy range as scanned by Borexino, physicists were not able to confirm the specific energy-dependent effect of solar neutrino oscillations. Borexino has now filled this gap and for the first time observed evidence of neutrino oscillation in vacuum, as they travel between the sun and Earth.

Pocar says that from the astrophysics angle, Borexino’s ability to conduct “precision physics” experiments and collect a large number of observations, with concomitant higher statistical power, is yielding data that show how our sun works. As for the possibility of discovering a new kind of neutrino coming from the sun, which is allowed by some theoretical extensions to the Standard Model of particle physics, he adds, “You always have the hope of seeing surprises, some small deviation from the expectations. And this you can only have if your accuracy and precision are good enough to see very small variations.”

In a companion paper, the Borexino team says their ⁷Be solar neutrino flux measurements show no flow differences between day and night. Some had hypothesized that one might exist because neutrinos pass through Earth’s bulk at night. But Pocar says, “The traverse through the Earth seems not to change neutrinos’ flavor.”

In the future, the researchers hope to identify the origin of every neutrino type coming from the sun, particularly to assess the relative levels of carbon, nitrogen and oxygen there, to deepen understanding of how the sun evolved and how its workings are related to that of larger stars.

Borexino is an international collaboration funded by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Italian National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN) which manages the Gran Sasso labs and similar organizations in Germany, Russia and Poland.

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by University of Massachusetts at Amherst.

Journal Reference:

1. G. Bellini, J. Benziger, D. Bick, S. Bonetti, G. Bonfini, M. Buizza Avanzini, B. Caccianiga, L. Cadonati, F. Calaprice, C. Carraro, P. Cavalcante, A. Chavarria, D. D’Angelo, S. Davini, A. Derbin, A. Etenko, K. Fomenko, D. Franco, C. Galbiati, S. Gazzana, C. Ghiano, M. Giammarchi, M. Goeger-Neff, A. Goretti, L. Grandi, E. Guardincerri, S. Hardy, Aldo Ianni, Andrea Ianni, V. Kobychev, D. Korablev, G. Korga, Y. Koshio, D. Kryn, M. Laubenstein, T. Lewke, E. Litvinovich, B. Loer, F. Lombardi, P. Lombardi, L. Ludhova, I. Machulin, S. Manecki, W. Maneschg, G. Manuzio, Q. Meindl, E. Meroni, L. Miramonti, M. Misiaszek, D. Montanari, P. Mosteiro, V. Muratova, L. Oberauer, M. Obolensky, F. Ortica, M. Pallavicini, L. Papp, C. Peña-Garay, L. Perasso, S. Perasso, A. Pocar, R. Raghavan, G. Ranucci, A. Razeto, A. Re, A. Romani, A. Sabelnikov, R. Saldanha, C. Salvo, S. Schönert, H. Simgen, M. Skorokhvatov, O. Smirnov, A. Sotnikov, S. Sukhotin, Y. Suvorov, R. Tartaglia, G. Testera, D. Vignaud, R. Vogelaar, F. von Feilitzsch, J. Winter, M. Wojcik, A. Wright, M. Wurm, J. Xu, O. Zaimidoroga, S. Zavatarelli, G. Zuzel. Precision Measurement of the ⁷Be Solar Neutrino Interaction Rate in Borexino. Physical Review Letters, 2011; 107 (14) DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.141302

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Disclaimer: Views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of ScienceDaily or its staff.

Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111007113949.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power

Oct 8 2011

Wireless window contacts: No maintenance, no batteries

ScienceDaily (Oct. 7, 2011) — Window contacts tell us which of a house’s windows are open or closed. Researchers have now developed a fail-safe system that is particularly easy to use and needs no wiring or batteries. The sensors harvest the energy they need to run from ambient radio signals.

It is 7:30 a.m. and high time she left the house; she mustn’t be late for her 8 o’clock appointment. But the young lady still feels the need to check that she closed all her windows, because the forecast is for thunderstorms that afternoon. Later, in the car, she realizes that she forgot to check one of the rooms when she went round the house. In situations like this, window contacts can make life easier and give peace of mind. These little electronic helpers are fitted onto window handles, and they can tell from the position of the handle whether the window is wide open, tilted open or closed. They transmit this information to a base station, and the house’s occupants can then see at a glance which windows are open.

Research scientists at the Fraunhofer Institute for Microelectronic Circuits and Systems IMS in Duisburg have now developed a version of this sensor arrangement that is particularly reliable and easy to use and which needs no wiring or batteries. “Our wireless window contacts draw all their energy from ambient radio signals,” explains Dr. Gerd vom Bögel, a scientist at the IMS. Until now, wireless models have been reliant on either batteries or solar cells, but both of these approaches have drawbacks. Batteries need to be changed regularly to keep window contacts operational.

Solar-powered systems avoid this problem, but they too are liable to fail: all it takes is for the sunlight to be blocked by something casting an unintentional shadow over the solar cell. Solar systems are also aesthetically less pleasing because they cannot be tucked away in a dark corner of the window. Which leaves the classic setup: window contacts with cable connections. Such systems have been on the market for years. The main argument against these is the effort it takes to install them — quite apart from the fact that it is often impossible to retrofit them to existing buildings.

The new system, however, can be fitted with little effort — and they can be positioned very discreetly. Aside from window contacts, each room is equipped with a room controller. This transmitter module not only receives the data from individual window contacts, it also actively provides the sensors with energy via its radio signal. The room controller also has the function of passing the sensor data on to a central base station in the building, from which users can query the status of all windows. Alternatively, the system can be configured to permit remote querying, for instance from a user’s smartphone. The only prerequisite for this is a DSL connection for the base station.

Energy management was the issue which caused the most headaches during development. “Room controllers, too, have to comply with certain limits on the strength of their radio output. This makes it particularly tricky to get enough energy to all the window contacts in bigger rooms,” vom Bögel points out. “But we have made sure all the sensor modules, antennas and components are so finely tuned to each other that the system works reliably even over considerable distances.”

The IMS research scientists have already constructed an initial prototype, and they know which way they want to head next: They are hoping to integrate other types of sensor into the system along the same lines — to regulate room temperature, for example. At the moment, thermostats are generally fitted somewhere just inside the room. If a door is open, the temperature by the door will be lower than in the middle of the room. As a result, the thermostat will then unnecessarily regulate the temperature upwards. The new system would allow a temperature sensor to be placed unobtrusively precisely where a particular temperature is desired — for instance on the display cabinet by the dining room table.

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft.

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Article source: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/10/111007102914.htm

By jimmy • Solar • 0 • Tags: Soar Power