full transcript
From the Ted Talk by Aaswath Raman: How we can turn the cold of outer space into a renewable resource
Unscramble the Blue Letters
So just imagine that — something that is below freezing on a hot summer's day. So, while I'm very ecxeitd about all we can do for cooling, and I think there's a lot yet to be done, as a scientist, I'm also drawn to a more profound opportunity that I believe this work highlights. We can use the cold darkness of space to iomprve the efficiency of every energy-related process here on earth. One such process I'd like to highlight are solar cells. They heat up under the sun and become less efficient the httoer they are. In 2015, we showed that with deliberate kinds of microstructures on top of a solar cell, we could take better advantage of this cooling effect to maintain a solar cell passively at a lower tamutprreee. This allows the cell to oaeprte more efficiently. We're probing these kinds of ointouepitrps further. We're asking whether we can use the cold of space to help us with water conservation. Or perhaps with off-grid scenarios. Perhaps we could even directly graetene power with this cold. There's a large temperature difference between us here on eatrh and the cold of space. That difference, at least conceptually, could be used to drive something cealld a heat engine to generate ecirctletiy. Could we then make a nighttime power-generation dcevie that gareteens useful amounts of electricity when solar cells don't work? Could we generate light from darkness?
Open Cloze
So just imagine that — something that is below freezing on a hot summer's day. So, while I'm very _______ about all we can do for cooling, and I think there's a lot yet to be done, as a scientist, I'm also drawn to a more profound opportunity that I believe this work highlights. We can use the cold darkness of space to _______ the efficiency of every energy-related process here on earth. One such process I'd like to highlight are solar cells. They heat up under the sun and become less efficient the ______ they are. In 2015, we showed that with deliberate kinds of microstructures on top of a solar cell, we could take better advantage of this cooling effect to maintain a solar cell passively at a lower ___________. This allows the cell to _______ more efficiently. We're probing these kinds of _____________ further. We're asking whether we can use the cold of space to help us with water conservation. Or perhaps with off-grid scenarios. Perhaps we could even directly ________ power with this cold. There's a large temperature difference between us here on _____ and the cold of space. That difference, at least conceptually, could be used to drive something ______ a heat engine to generate ___________. Could we then make a nighttime power-generation ______ that _________ useful amounts of electricity when solar cells don't work? Could we generate light from darkness?
Solution
- earth
- device
- opportunities
- temperature
- electricity
- operate
- called
- generate
- improve
- hotter
- excited
- generates
Original Text
So just imagine that — something that is below freezing on a hot summer's day. So, while I'm very excited about all we can do for cooling, and I think there's a lot yet to be done, as a scientist, I'm also drawn to a more profound opportunity that I believe this work highlights. We can use the cold darkness of space to improve the efficiency of every energy-related process here on earth. One such process I'd like to highlight are solar cells. They heat up under the sun and become less efficient the hotter they are. In 2015, we showed that with deliberate kinds of microstructures on top of a solar cell, we could take better advantage of this cooling effect to maintain a solar cell passively at a lower temperature. This allows the cell to operate more efficiently. We're probing these kinds of opportunities further. We're asking whether we can use the cold of space to help us with water conservation. Or perhaps with off-grid scenarios. Perhaps we could even directly generate power with this cold. There's a large temperature difference between us here on earth and the cold of space. That difference, at least conceptually, could be used to drive something called a heat engine to generate electricity. Could we then make a nighttime power-generation device that generates useful amounts of electricity when solar cells don't work? Could we generate light from darkness?
Frequently Occurring Word Combinations
ngrams of length 2
collocation |
frequency |
cooling systems |
4 |
cooling system |
4 |
air temperature |
4 |
degrees celsius |
3 |
greenhouse gas |
3 |
degrees fahrenheit |
2 |
air conditioner |
2 |
refrigeration systems |
2 |
gas emissions |
2 |
climate change |
2 |
thermal radiation |
2 |
infrared light |
2 |
cooling effect |
2 |
length scales |
2 |
save energy |
2 |
cold darkness |
2 |
solar cells |
2 |
ngrams of length 3
collocation |
frequency |
greenhouse gas emissions |
2 |
Important Words
- advantage
- amounts
- called
- cell
- cells
- cold
- conceptually
- conservation
- cooling
- darkness
- day
- deliberate
- device
- difference
- drawn
- drive
- earth
- effect
- efficiency
- efficient
- efficiently
- electricity
- engine
- excited
- freezing
- generate
- generates
- heat
- highlight
- highlights
- hot
- hotter
- imagine
- improve
- kinds
- large
- light
- lot
- maintain
- microstructures
- nighttime
- operate
- opportunities
- opportunity
- passively
- power
- probing
- process
- profound
- scenarios
- scientist
- showed
- solar
- space
- sun
- temperature
- top
- water
- work