'Invisible' Solar Technologies from Bio-Inspired Optics

数十亿年来，自然界通过自然选择优化了结构，这一过程将永远超过我们进行的任何“反复试验”的优化程序。工程师们可以从这些成就中学到很多东西。甘蓝白(Pieris Brassicae)和玻璃翼(Greta-Oto)蝴蝶拥有独特的轻巧、反射和透明的翅膀，此前已被证明比目前的光学材料轻17倍。太阳能聚光器(如用于聚焦太阳光的放大镜)是一项正在开发的技术，它可以利用廉价的玻璃或塑料光学元件将阳光集中到光伏电池板上(这些聚光光伏系统被称为CPV系统)。这些系统可以减少所需的昂贵的大量开采的光伏材料，同时保持总体功率输出。然而，CPV可能会很繁琐，因此有很好的机会通过仿生将聚光器光伏(光学+太阳能电池板)和自然轻质结构(蝴蝶翅膀纳米结构)的这些学科结合在一起，以获得显著更高的太阳能技术功率重量比。可再生能源融入智能电网、建筑、车辆和周围基础设施，是减少碳排放和推动社会可持续生活方式的重要途径。这一复杂的挑战需要跨学科的研究和创新的设计。该奖学金的目标是制造新型的生物启发光学器件，其功率重量比至少是聚光式太阳能技术的三倍。光学元件的表面结构对光的重定向和吸收有重要影响。微结构光学和涂层显示了CPV设备更高的功率输出和可靠性，但减轻重量的设计还需要探索。菲涅尔透镜是凸透镜的一种更轻的截断版本，直到轻质聚甲基丙烯酸甲酯(PMMA)的发现才变得流行起来，使它们变得更加实惠和实用。这是CPV在其早期阶段的一项突破，并鼓励进一步的突破，以需要与这里建议的特定集中器设计相匹配的新的重量减轻方法。这将在纳米、微观和宏观工程水平上进行，以获得最佳性能并确保产出和影响。最终的目标是生产高性能的轻质CPV电池板，这种电池板比目前的光伏电池板更谨慎，甚至可以隐形地集成到建筑物中。该奖学金概述了理论和实验方法，重点放在材料和制造特性上，并辅之以产业合作和开发，以归功于这一开创性研究的广泛影响。这样的跨学科研究将首先为太阳能、光学、制造、纳米技术和生物学等学科提供新的解决方案和理解，但也将通过与艺术家和公司的合作来纳入公众对能源的看法，以增加这项研究的影响，并展示和鼓励跨学科研究本身。

Nature has optimised structures over billions of years through natural selection, a process which will forever exceed any 'trial and error' optimisation routine carried out by ourselves. Engineers can learn much from these achievements. The Cabbage white (Pieris brassicae) and Glasswing (Greta-Oto) butterflies have uniquely lightweight reflective and transparent wings which has been previously proven to be 17x lighter than current optical materials. Solar Concentrators (such as magnifying lenses designed for focusing the suns light) are a developing technology, which can utilise cheap glass or plastic optics to concentrate sunlight onto photovoltaic panels (these Concentrator photovoltaic systems are called CPV systems). These systems can reduce the amount of expensive heavily mined photovoltaic material required whilst maintaining the overall power output. CPV's can however be cumbersome, and so there lies a great opportunity to marry these disciplines of concentrator photovoltaics (optics+Solar panels) and natural lightweight structures (butterfly wing nanostructures) via biomimicry to gain significantly higher power-to-weight ratios for solar energy technology. Renewable energy, integrated into smart grids, buildings, vehicles and surrounding infrastructures, is an important pathway to reducing carbon emissions and advancing a sustainable lifestyle within society. This complex challenge demands interdisciplinary research and innovative design.This fellowship aims to manufacture novel bio-inspired optics capable of at least tripling the power-to-weight ratio of concentrator solar energy technology. The surface structure of optics has significant effects on the light redirection and absorption. Micro-structured optics and coatings have shown rewards of increased power output and reliability for CPV devices but reduced weight designs require exploring. Fresnel lenses -an already lighter truncated version of convex lenses- only became popular with the discovery of lightweight poly(methylmethacrylate) (PMMA), making them more affordable and practical. This was a breakthrough for CPV in its very early years, and encourages further breakthroughs to entail new weight reduction methods matched to specific concentrator designs, as proposed here. This will be done on a nano, micro and macro level of engineering to obtain optimal performance and ensure outputs and impact. The production of high performing lightweight CPV panels which are more discreet than current PV panels and even invisibly integrated into buildings is the ultimate objective. This fellowship outlines theoretical and experimental methods, with strong focuses on materials and manufacturing characterisation aided by industrial collaboration and exploitation to credit the wide-spread impact of this pioneering research. Interdisciplinary research such as this will provide new solutions and understanding to firstly the disciplines of solar energy, optics, manufacturing, nanotechnology and biology but also branching off to incorporate the public perceptions of energy through collaborations with artists and companies to increase the impact of this research as well as showcasing and encouraging interdisciplinary research itself.