Here on Earth, Natcore Technology has created the world's first commercially viable absolute black silicon cell, which can make virtually 100 percent of received sunlight available for conversion into electricity.

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Some silicon solar cell makers have been able to hit 21% on their best days, but doing so consistently and in high volumes are far more difficult. (Panel efficiency is usually a bit lower than cell efficiency).

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The idea was to produce silicon for things like cell phones and those big boxes in Telco datacenters.

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That is not great compared with the 20% and more achieved by a silicon-based solar cell, the 40% managed by a solar-thermal turbine, or even the 18-20% of one of the new generation of cheap and cheerful thin-film solar cells.

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But last year solar cell manufacturers bought more silicon wafers than chipmakers--and solar's demand for wafers is growing three times as fast as demand from the rest of the electronics industry.

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Chicory came up with a way to embed this software trick directly into a half-millimeter-square section of a silicon chip, making an otherwise slow-witted cell phone chip act like a genius.

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Chicory came up with a way to embed this software trick directly into a half-millimeter-square section of a silicon chip, making an otherwise slow-witted cell phone chip behave like a genius.

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Suntech Power is currently pursuing thin film technology, a low cost PV technology that involves depositing several thin layers of silicon or more complex materials on a substrate such as glass to make a PV cell.

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Whatever brave face your cell phone or PC puts on, don't be fooled: Between the layers of silicon, all is not well.

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