Imagine a field of small wires—standing at attention like a tiny field of wheat—gathering the Sun’s rays as the first step in solar energy conversion.
Researchers at the University of Illinois at
Urbana-Champaign have achieved new levels of performance for seed-free and
substrate-free arrays of nanowires from class of materials called III-V
(three-five) directly on graphene. These compound semiconductors hold
particular promise for applications involving light, such as solar cells or
lasers.