Living Organism Combined with Solar PV Chip

Living Organism Combined with Solar PV Chip


March 23, 2004 [SolarAccess.com] In one of the more novel and un-chartered developments in solar photovoltaic (PV) research, a team of scientists from around the country have apparently combined a living organism with a solar PV chip. Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) announced that a joint research group consisted of researchers from AIST, the Tokyo University of Science, the University of Tokyo, Shizuoka University and the Tokyo Institute of Technology has succeeded in developing the world's first bio photosensor. Combining a living organism and a silicon chip, the new photosensor can convert light into electricity. Use of the photoelectric converting section of a blue-green bacterium, which can achieve "near perfect quantum yields in photoelectric conversion", enabling photoelectric conversion that produces a very low level of heat.