Arnon Lesage (UvA): SolarFoil
Arnon Lesage (UvA): SolarFoil
Plants need light to grow, and a world that requires more food needs light optimized towards agriculture. We are developing a transparent layer that can manipulate sunlight into light optimized for agriculture. Sunlight contains useful light, but also harmful UV and green light which is not so efficiently used. Our nanotechnology allows us to modify sunlight and create a resulting light spectrum that increases crop yields. In the Lab we test this on micro-algae cultures, we see them growing 10-20% faster when under SolarFoil manipulated sunlight.
We envision SolarFoil tailored to different crops, to flowers to tomato’s, in greenhouses in polytunnels using only sunlight as it’s source, both increasing useful light in the Netherlands, and decreasing harmful light in sunny Spain.
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