新奇事件簿 麻省理工发现获取太阳能新方式（在线收听）

Researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have discovered a new way of capturing the Sun’s energy. A team from MIT has created a new technique that involves coating windows with special chemical dyes. The dyes help trap the light from the Sun and send it to special storage cells that then convert the light into electricity. The team’s discovery could transform buildings into energy plants. It could even one day mean that the windows in our houses could power our homes. The scientists say their dyes can produce ten times more power than the traditional solar panels used around the world today. They predict that this clean and renewable energy technology could be available within the next three years.

美国麻省理工学院研究人员发现一种获取太阳能的新方式：将特殊的化学染料与镀膜窗户结合在一起。这种染料可以截获太阳光，将其发送至特殊蓄电池中，转换为电能。通过这一发现，建筑物将成为发电厂。也就意味着，将来有一天人们家中的窗户可以为房屋提供能源。科学家称，与目前全球使用的传统的太阳能电池板相比，这种染料产生的能量超过其十倍之多，并预言，这种清洁可再生能源技术将在未来三年内投入使用。

The idea was first developed in the 1970s but was abandoned. Scientists then found that too much of the collected sunlight failed to reach the solar storage units at the edges of the window. The MIT engineers revived the idea and used colored dyes to stop the light from escaping. MIT’s development also does away with the need for hundreds of bulky solar cells. Instead, their method only requires cells around the edges of the window. MIT’s Professor Baldo explained: "The coated glass would let through about 10 per cent of the Sun to light up the room, and the remainder would be captured and funneled to the edges to solar cells to generate electricity. It would look like smoked glass because of the dyes." The new discovery could help fight climate change.

这一观点于20世纪70年代首次提出，然而未得以实践。因为当时的科学家发现，收集的大多数太阳光无法到达窗棱上的太阳能储存装置。麻省理工学院工程师重新提出了这一观点，并采用彩色染料阻止太阳光流失。此外，研发过程中无需大量太阳能电池，仅需在窗棱四周放置电池。麻省理工学院的巴尔多教授说道：“大约10%的太阳光可穿过镀膜玻璃照亮房间，剩余的太阳光将被捕获，并汇集到窗棱上的太阳能电池中从而进行发电。由于染料的作用，镀膜玻璃看起来就像烟色玻璃。”这一新发现可以有助于对抗气候变化。