Capturing solar energy at night?

By modifying a standard solar panel using a thermoelectric generator to product currents from temperature differences, Shanhui Fan and their colleagues from Stanford University have created a solar panel which can generate enough electricity to power an LED light (or charge your phone).

Exploiting the fact that solar panels radiate heat towards a lower temperature, in this case, towards space and in turn makes solar panels actually cooler than then night are has allowed these researchers to effectively create panels which generate electricity without the use of the sun.

“The nice aspect about this approach is that you essentially have a direct power source at night that does not require any battery storage,” says Fan

Whilst the potential for large-scale energy generation isn't viable with this product - according to Ken Durose at the University of Liverpool. Scaling it up to improve existing solar arrays and panels as well as the technology itself being improved upon to generate more electricity is more than attainable to help with low power tasks in "off-grid" situations and according to Fan and his team, in contention with Prof. Durose - "there are no intrinsic difficulties in one day scaling the system up to a commercial product"

Read more here - https://www.newscientist.com/article/2314957-solar-panels-that-work-at-night-produce-enough-power-to-charge-a-phone/