Coal Solar Cells for a Summer Project

An article in the Saluki Times on June 28th talked about sustainability projects that received funding from the Green Fund, a student fee-backed award program. One of the projects is based on a recently filed SIUC patent: Coal Solar Cells. The Saluki Times reported as follows about the award:

Using coal to reap solar energy -- $9,942 to explore the use of coal as a solar cell sensitizer thus decreasing the cost-to-energy output ratio to be competitive with burning coal to produce energy.

SIUC professor Lichang Wang, the inventor who filed the Coal Solar Cells patent, said that they hope to have a demo by the end of the support.