Purple Pokeberries Yield Cheap Solar Power

separsons writes "Researchers at Wake Forest's Center for Nanotechnology and Molecular Materials created a low-cost solar power system geared towards developing nations. By coating fiber-based solar cells with dye from purple pokeberries, a common weed, scientists created a cheap yet highly efficient solar system. Wake Forest researchers and their accompanying company, FiberCell Inc., have filed for a patent for fiber-based solar. Plastic sheets are stamped with plastic fibers, creating millions of tiny 'cans' that trap light until it is absorbed. The fibers create a huge surface area, meaning sunlight can be collected at any angle from the time the sun rises until it sets. Coating the system with pokeberry dye creates even greater absorption: researchers say the system can produce twice as much power as traditional flat-cell technology."

Re:And abandoned fields...

[O('_')O_Bush]

According to watersheds.org:

"Salat is the German word for salad, and probably came to the Ozarks with German settlers. Poke salat is made from Pokeweed."

Re:And abandoned fields...

[irondonkey]

Don't ask me what salat means, though. I have no idea.

Salad. At least in german.

Great...

[ProdigyPuNk]

Most of the "Developing nations" out there are still having trouble with clean water, roads, and reliable power. So we're going to stick them with solar ? First, who is going to pay for it ? Second, if they aren't getting reliable power through more traditional means (like coal), how is this REALLY going to help them at all ?

Re:And abandoned fields...

[ehrichweiss]

Poke doesn't become non-toxic regardless of the amount of boiling. I had to look it up a few years ago when I was considering harvesting some from our backyard.

Re:Great...

[FooAtWFU]

A small local solar generator may be more reliable than a large distant coal plant if there's likely to be interruptions in the power grid or political/economic turmoil which shuts the coal plant down or topples power lines. It's not "run a huge factory and light your home at night" but it could run some small agricultural equipment (a small mill, perhaps) or provide power for some communications equipment (radio, television, charge a cell phone) and things like that.

The actual article

[xilmaril]

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100429141430.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily+(ScienceDaily%3A+Latest+Science+News) [sciencedaily.com]

The summary link is to a blog, which gives a short not too useful summary and then links to this Science Daily article.

I like how Science Daily includes APA and MLA citation information at the bottom of their articles. Also, it seems like the fiber-based solar cells this article is about are the development, and the purple pokeberries are one of many possible natural or artificial dyes which could be used.

It's a shame that the article tells us nothing about how the fiber-based solar cells work. Here is some information on that:
http://www.fibercellinc.com/Technology.html [fibercellinc.com]

The patent is with the EPO (european parliament patent office), so if anyone could find that, it'd be rad.

Re:Still need nuclear

[Nadaka]

You made a huge error on your math there.

If we include all energy use (even cars) the US uses about 29 PW/a (29000000000000000 Watts per year) or about 79397672826830 Watts / day.

Current solar thermal power plants can operate around 30% efficiency without much difficulty at least 8 hours per day. So each meter^2 of solar plant can generate 2640 Watts / day.

That means we can supply 100% of our energy needs with about 30074876070 meter^2 of solar plant.

That is a square in the Arizona desert 173421 meters wide (just over a hundred miles).

Of course, I really want to see us invest in nuclear power as well, but you are completely underestimating the potential of solar.

more like "resident", amirite?

[Anonymous Coward]

js christ, more inhabitant spam. can we get a section for these so we can ignore them?

Re:Still need nuclear

[coolsnowmen]

You might have a really good point, but is nullified by the fact that terawatts is a unit of power not energy.

Re:And abandoned fields...

[ehrichweiss]

Yeah, I wouldn't bet my health on wikipedia's advice entirely if I were you. The poison is still present and it does cause problems. I imagine that the author of the page lived in a rural area where such lore was common(as I did) and they probably don't know any better. Seeing as how the severity of the poison is listed as "HIGHLY TOXIC, MAY BE FATAL IF EATEN!", I prefer to simply settle with some turnip greens or kale, which I find actually tastes better anyway, especially with some ham or bacon(mmm...bacon)..but I digress.

Re:Pokeberries?

[infinitelink]

Bionerd here...to the rescue. "Virgin birth" has a technical name, "parthenogensis", and yes, offspring from it have DNA 'similar' (we'll just leave it that simply for purposes of this reply) to the mother's; the trouble is that, contrary to your statement, it does not occur in human beings.

Parthenogenesis is well-documented and researched in non-mammalian species, and the many factors that would be necessary for mammalian parthenogenesis are also well-researched, but the actual occurrence is not only nil, the closest phenomena (which aren't) aren't close: maybe a tumor here or there growing weirdly. As a matter of fact, many many many mechanisms exist cellularly to block an egg cell from getting anywhere near some state of capacity to produce another human being: and for many good reasons. But as with the first aforementioned "leaving it at that", we'll leave it simply at that, for the purposes of this reply.

For now, leave the realm of miracles with...God. (The actual documented cases of parthenogenesis have none of the significance as the biblical event, nor do the processes and mechanisms of the natural events map to human intracellular processes, by the way.)

Besides that, I liked some of your replies up there. : )