Song Haomin, Liu Youhai, Liu Zhejun, Singer Matthew H, Li Chenyu, Cheney Alec R, Ji Dengxin, Zhou Lyu, Zhang Nan, Zeng Xie, Bei Zongmin, Yu Zongfu, Jiang Suhua, Gan Qiaoqiang
Department of Electrical Engineering The State University of New York at Buffalo Buffalo NY 14260 USA.
Material Science Department Fudan University Shanghai 200433 China.
Adv Sci (Weinh). 2018 May 3;5(8):1800222. doi: 10.1002/advs.201800222. eCollection 2018 Aug.
100% efficiency is the ultimate goal for all energy harvesting and conversion applications. However, no energy conversion process is reported to reach this ideal limit before. Here, an example with near perfect energy conversion efficiency in the process of solar vapor generation below room temperature is reported. Remarkably, when the operational temperature of the system is below that of the surroundings (i.e., under low density solar illumination), the total vapor generation rate is higher than the upper limit that can be produced by the input solar energy because of extra energy taken from the warmer environment. Experimental results are provided to validate this intriguing strategy under 1 sun illumination. The best measured rate is ≈2.20 kg m h under 1 sun illumination, well beyond its corresponding upper limit of 1.68 kg m h and is even faster than the one reported by other systems under 2 sun illumination.
100%的效率是所有能量收集与转换应用的终极目标。然而，此前尚无报道称有能量转换过程能达到这一理想极限。在此，报道了一个在室温以下的太阳能蒸汽生成过程中具有近乎完美能量转换效率的例子。值得注意的是，当系统的运行温度低于周围环境温度时（即低密度太阳光照条件下），由于从较温暖的环境中获取了额外能量，总的蒸汽生成速率高于输入太阳能所能产生的上限。提供了实验结果以验证在1个太阳光照强度下的这一有趣策略。在1个太阳光照强度下测得的最佳速率约为2.20 kg m⁻² h⁻¹，远超其相应的1.68 kg m⁻² h⁻¹的上限，甚至比其他系统在2个太阳光照强度下报道的速率还要快。
