Self-assembling solar cells built using ancient wisdom, modern technology

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http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2010/01/15jan10selfa0b35x.jpg (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8452912.stm)Alright, so self-assembling electronics (http://www.engadget.com/2008/10/27/jhu-researchers-create-self-assembling-organic-wires/) are hardly new in and of themselves, and nanoscale tech tends to always come with bombastic promises (http://www.engadget.com/2009/03/01/self-assembling-nanoscale-discovery-could-catapult-data-storage/), but you don't wanna miss how this latest innovation is built. Two professors from the University of Minnesota have successfully demonstrated a self-assembly technique that arranges microscopic electronic elements in their proper order thanks to the absolute enmity that exists between water and oil. By coating elements with a hydrophilic layer on one side and some hypdrophobic goo on the other, they've achieved the proper element orientation, and the final step in their work was the insertion of a pre-drilled, pre-soldered sheet, which picks up each element while being slowly drawn out of the liquid non-mixture. The achievement here is in finding the perfect densities of water and oil to make the magic happen, and a working device of 64,000 elements has been shown off -- taking only three minutes to put together. If the method's future proves successful, we'll all be using electronics built on flexible, plastic, metal, or otherwise unconventional substrates sometime soon.Self-assembling solar cells built using ancient wisdom, modern technology (http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/15/self-assembling-solar-cells-built-using-ancient-wisdom-modern-t/) originally appeared on Engadget (http://www.engadget.com) on Fri, 15 Jan 2010 09:14:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds (http://www.weblogsinc.com/feed-terms/).


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