Gold 'supraballs' nearly double solar energy absorption in tests

Sunbeams contain a lot of energy. But current technology for harvesting solar power doesn't capture as much as it could. Now, in ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces, researchers report that gold nanospheres, named supraballs, can absorb nearly all wavelengths in sunlight—including some that traditional photovoltaic materials miss. Applying a layer of supraballs onto a commercially available electricity converter demonstrated that the technology nearly doubled solar energy absorption compared to traditional materials.