Other projects have used plasmons to heat water, but this new test has increased the efficiency with “black gold.” A new material produced by the scientists uses gold particulates in a variety of sizes, a few “tens of billionths of a meter wide,” so small that the gold looks black. This mixture absorbs 99% of all visible and infrared light, and up to 90% of that light is converted to heat.
While the efficiency of this material is not record holding, carbon nanotubes are more efficient at converting light to heat, this material is much less expensive to produce and more readily applied to current uses of steam.
Click here to read the full article on Student Science.