/sci/ - Science & Math

>>11360112
it's just black paint. You can print solar cells directly on to surfaces in space though. You can make a solar cell by using vacuum deposition, which works in space because space is a very high quality vacuum. It's even possible to pave solar cells directly onto the lunar surface.
https://ntrs.nasa.gov/archive/nasa/casi.ntrs.nasa.gov/20050110155.pdf
The issue is getting good enough silicon though. It becomes much easier to make silicon once you have access to hydrogen. Hydrogen's also useful for propellant and if we can't make propellant in space, there's really not much point in making solar cells.

>>10828566
That's not the point. The point is that the concentration of thorium is VERY LOW. This makes it difficult to extract.
>>See the first presentation in the first post!
TEXT AND PAPERS ONLY!
>>10828595
>> bringing a shit ton of inefficient solar panels
you don't have to because you can make them with materials available on the Moon.
>>which gets dusty
with a couple of charged wires you can capture all of the electrostatically charged moon dust. In addition, the laser retroreflectors on the moon have dimmed by about 90% over a FIFTY YEAR time period, so we need not clean our solar panels all that much.
http://stochasticscientist.blogspot.com/2010/04/dimming-moon-reflectors.html
>>are close to impossible to produce on the moon
They are not. In fact the Moon's high vacuum environment makes producing them easier than on earth. We can pave solar cells directly on to the surface of the Moon. We can melt regolith to make a nice flat surface, vacuum deposit aluminum, deposit silicon, dope, put on the top electrode by vacuum depositing calcium, aluminum or iron through a mask, and them depositing a layer of TiO2 for an antireflection coating(although we could also use AlO_x or SiO_x). We perform molten oxide electrolysis of the regolith to obtain a ferrosilicon melt. We extract the silicon from the melt through repeated vacuum distillation. In the process we also get iron. We might even be able to get aluminum from molten oxide electrolysis too, barring that we should be able to extract the alumina from the regolith and carry out a process such as Hall–Héroult to get aluminum. We get the TiO2 from ilmenite available on the moon which we reduce with hydrogen. For P-type dopants it's best to ship them from earth or somewhere else because we only micrograms per meter^2. We can get phosporous or sulfur from lunar regolith
http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/library/meetings/annual/jun00/433Ignatiev.pdf
http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/studies/final_report/433Ignatiev.pdf

>>9225664
And breaking silicon dioxide into silicon good enough for solar cells is the problem.

Pic related though it shits solar cells. Still requires silicon though.

I'm a bit loopy right now so I'll post more later
>>9225670
~7% of the Moon's mass is probably good enough for conductors.
>>9225652
Fuck no. Photosynthesis is inefficient as fuck. Not to mention the Moon has basically no carbon.
>>9225671
What the fuck are you smoking?

>>8237849
Mars is a bit harder because it has an atmosphere. Because the Moon has an extremely high vacuum, a number of important industrial processes become easy. For example, because you have high vacuum you can do vacuum deposition, doping, and other fun high vacuum processes, which means you can pave solar cells on the Moon:
http://www.niac.usra.edu/files/library/meetings/annual/jun00/433Ignatiev.pdf

>>can we really call it conquering space?
It's more of conquering space than sending some meatbags up, planting a flag, and leaving. If we ever want to live in space, we will need to industrialize space.