The study, led by Gozden Torun at EPFL's Galatea Lab and detailed in her thesis, revolves around the intriguing effects of exposing tellurite glass to femtosecond laser light. Femtosecond lasers, known for their ultra-short light pulses, have been utilized to create nanoscale patterns of tellurium and tellurium oxide crystals within the glass. These crystals, being semiconducting materials, form precisely where the glass interacts with the laser light.
The "eureka moment" arrived when the team discovered that these embedded crystals could potentially lead to the generation of electricity when exposed to daylight. "Tellurium being semiconducting, based on this finding we wondered if it would be possible to write durable patterns on the tellurite glass surface that could reliably induce electricity when exposed to light, and the answer is yes," explains Yves Bellouard, who leads the Galatea Laboratory at EPFL.
This discovery is significant for its simplicity and efficiency. Unlike previous methods that require the addition of multiple materials to create photoconductive surfaces, this technique needs only two elements: tellurite glass and a femtosecond laser. The process essentially transforms the glass into an active photoconductive material, capable of generating electrical current under light exposure.
Using tellurite glass produced by their colleagues at Tokyo Tech, the EPFL team applied their expertise in femtosecond laser technology to modify the glass's structure and analyze its photoconductive properties. Gozden Torun's experiments showed promising results. After etching a simple line pattern onto a 1 cm diameter tellurite glass piece, she observed that it could generate a current under UV light and the visible spectrum, maintaining this capability reliably for months.
"It's fantastic, we're locally turning glass into a semiconductor using light," says Yves Bellouard, highlighting the transformative nature of their work. He likened their achievement to the "dream of the alchemist," where materials are converted into new forms with enhanced properties.
This development holds significant potential for future applications in energy harvesting and sensing technologies. The ability to turn windows or other glass surfaces into single-material light harvesters and sensors using a straightforward, durable process could revolutionize the way we interact with and utilize light and energy in our daily lives.
Research Report:Femtosecond-laser direct-write photoconductive patterns on tellurite glass
Related Links
Swiss Federal Institute of Technology Lausanne
Powering The World in the 21st Century at Energy-Daily.com
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