Melissa: 00:09

Hey. I'm Melissa.

Jam: 00:11

I'm Jam.

Melissa: 00:11

And I'm a chemist.

Jam: 00:12

And I'm not.

Melissa: 00:13

And welcome to chemistry for your life.

Jam: 00:15

The podcast helps you understand the chemistry of your everyday life. And if it's one of your first times joining us, Melissa really is a chemist.

Melissa: 00:23

Yes. I really am a chemist. I'm trained in chemistry. I have a master's degree in chemistry. I'm working on my PhD, which technically means you could say I'm an expert.

Melissa: 00:33

But I do wanna remind everyone that just because I am qualified to talk chemistry. And just because I am, quote, an expert, that doesn't mean I know everything. I Do everything I can to make sure that I get answers right. But being an expert more means that you know how much you don't know. You're qualified to understand how little you know more than knowing everything.

Melissa: 00:58

So I just wanna remind you guys about that. Sometimes I can make mistakes. I do everything I can to check my answers and fact check and make sure I'm in giving you accurate information. We work really hard to achieve that. But if you ever have any questions or comments, I'm really open to that feedback.

Jam: 01:15

And I am definitely not a chemist, And so all the things that she said don't really apply to me because I don't know anything.

Melissa: 01:21

Pajama is an expert in radio, television, and film.

Jam: 01:24

Yes. That's true. But that doesn't mean I won't make mistakes. So you might hear the occasional actually, it kinda it does apply. I can say it in my own way.

Jam: 01:32

Yes. You might hear mistakes, which would Audio mistakes, which would definitely be my fault, and I'm very sorry if you hear those.

Melissa: 01:40

Well, today, we are going to talk about, On the topic of me having a master's degree, the research I did for my master's.

Jam: 01:47

Dude, nice. What what research did you do?

Melissa: 01:50

My research was on solar cells.

Jam: 01:52

Oh, dude.

Melissa: 01:53

So it's very applicable to our everyday life.

Jam: 01:55

Yes.

Melissa: 01:56

And, actually, I decided to do it because I have had a few listener questions where people what my research was most recently from Tom T.

Jam: 02:04

Mhmm.

Melissa: 02:04

So thank you guys for asking so much. This is a really good topic for learning about chemistry of everyday life, and it's fun for me to get to

Jam: 02:11

And I'm really excited. I'm very interested in solar stuff, but don't have any knowledge about how it works. So I'm excited.

Melissa: 02:18

Nice. So here's what we did in my lab.

Jam: 02:21

Okay.

Melissa: 02:22

We worked on building a better solar cell. So do you know what a solar cell is?

Jam: 02:28

When you say cell, do you mean, like, an actual cell? Like a like a little cell with Mhmm. Nucleus and stuff like that? No. Okay.

Jam: 02:36

So I do not then know what a solar cell is.

Melissa: 02:38

Perfect. So a solar cell is just a unit that converts sunlight into energy. It's also known as a photovoltaic cell.

Jam: 02:47

Okay.

Melissa: 02:47

So it just when they say cell, they refer to the fact that it's a single unit that can take the sun's Light and turn it into energy.

Jam: 02:55

Okay. Okay.

Melissa: 02:57

So you'll see solar cells on solar panels.

Jam: 03:00

Got it.

Melissa: 03:00

Solar panels are things that are on top of people's houses or in California in those big farms and solar panels.

Jam: 03:06

You can see the cells?

Melissa: 03:08

Yes. I don't know if you can see the individual cells, but the things that are coating solar panels Are solar cells.

Jam: 03:14

Okay.

Melissa: 03:16

I I think.

Jam: 03:17

Yeah. I don't think you can zoom in on

Melissa: 03:19

the individual. I didn't actually build the cells. There were people who I worked with who did build the cells, but I didn't work on building the cells.

Jam: 03:26

Yeah.

Melissa: 03:27

So I worked on the unit that absorbs the sun energy. So we'll talk about that more.

Jam: 03:33

Okay.

Melissa: 03:34

There are different types of solar cells in the planet They use different things. But we're today, we're gonna talk specifically about the solar cells I worked on.

Jam: 03:43

Okay.

Melissa: 03:43

And I think those are going to be the solar cells of the future Uh-huh. In my opinion because they rely the least on heavy toxic metals or nonrenewable resources to make their renewable resource harvesters.

Jam: 03:57

Yeah.

Melissa: 03:58

So the solar cells that I worked with used biomimicry.

Jam: 04:03

I remember that from last week.

Melissa: 04:05

Yes. I was Toving you out.

Jam: 04:06

That's the word, right, for for how we are trying to make things waterproof by looking at things in nature that are already very Waterproof or water resistant?

Melissa: 04:15

Yes.

Jam: 04:15

Right? Mhmm. Nice.

Melissa: 04:17

Biomimicry is exactly what it sounds. You mimic biology. You're mimicking nature.

Jam: 04:23

Yeah.

Melissa: 04:24

So, basically, science scientists take something that works really well in nature and try to Recreate it. Okay. So one of my very first questions when I came to the lab that I did my undergrad research in was, k. So if plants Are the best harvesters of the sun's energy and storage, which they are. Mhmm.

Melissa: 04:44

The carbohydrates we eat, all that stuff comes from plants taking the sun's energy and turning it into storable food energy. Mhmm. Then why don't we just do what plants do? Why can't we just do exactly what the plants already do? Yeah.

Melissa: 04:58

The answer was interesting. It's that we don't really know what plants do. So did you learn about Photosynthesis when you were in school?

Jam: 05:07

Yes. Yep.

Melissa: 05:09

So what you learned there is accurate and true, but it's not everything.

Jam: 05:14

Oh, yeah. That's what it seemed like. It seemed like like a few steps were cut out because it's it seemed very complicated. It was more like, here's a definition of it, and here's a couple, like, flyover steps of what happens. Mhmm.

Jam: 05:29

But The this didn't stick with me, really. Like, I don't I don't really remember that very well, to be honest with you. Right. But I also just don't remember it being very detailed.

Melissa: 05:36

Right. So they probably did simplify it down for your textbooks.

Jam: 05:40

Mhmm.

Melissa: 05:41

You learn more of the full process when you get into higher level biology classes. I took AP biology so long ago, and that was sort of the end of me caring about photosynthesis until I got to this lab. They've done a lot more work on bacteria that do photosynthesis, and so they understand even more than what you learned in the highest level of biology classes.

Jam: 06:01

Okay.

Melissa: 06:02

But we still don't know everything. Mhmm. We don't really understand how to recreate what plants do.

Jam: 06:10

Uh-huh. Which I

Melissa: 06:10

think is good for the hubris of scientists. We can do a lot, but we can't

Jam: 06:15

Not everything. Yeah. Can't do anything. We can't do what

Melissa: 06:17

nature is already Killing us at. Yeah. So nature is pretty amazing. But the basic idea of what happens in photosynthesis and that we try to recreate in my lab If sunlight is absorbed Mhmm. And that sunlight is energy, the molecules that absorb the energy have electrons that are excited.

Melissa: 06:36

We've talked about how electrons Well, take in energy and jump up to higher shelves, kind of.

Jam: 06:41

Mhmm.

Melissa: 06:42

So they take in energy, jump up to higher shelves. And when That energy is excited. When the electron is excited and it's holding energy, that energy is harvested in plants.

Jam: 06:53

Okay.

Melissa: 06:53

So that's a very, very basic understanding.

Jam: 06:56

Okay.

Melissa: 06:57

We try to recreate that in the lab that I did my undergrad research in. So we aimed to design and then make molecules that have similar properties to what we see plants do in photosynthesis. Uh-huh. And then optimize those to be the best they can be so that others who build solar cells and Commercialize them. Have that body of knowledge available.

Melissa: 07:23

Yeah. That's what we did.

Jam: 07:25

So it sounds like the the basic Main thing to take away from photosynthesis is the fact that because there's energy in Sunlight in ultraviolet rays, all that stuff, whatever's happening.

Melissa: 07:40

Mhmm.

Jam: 07:42

It excites the Electrons Mhmm. In we're talking about plants, right, still. So Mhmm. In the leaf of a plant or whatever. Mhmm.

Jam: 07:51

And that those electrons then, as they're excited, go up to a higher energy shelf. Mhmm. And because of that, there's, like, actual energy that can be then taken in and kept.

Melissa: 08:03

Right.

Jam: 08:03

So it's not just like a temporary thing that's like, oh, they're excited, and they're not.

Melissa: 08:07

Mhmm.

Jam: 08:07

It's like a they're continually excited because there's continually sunlight on them. It allows energy to be, like, taken in by the by the plant.

Melissa: 08:16

The question about if they're excited and they're not, they. We're gonna talk about that more. I can just get into it now. So they're excited, and the amount of time that they're excited is key to making better solar cells so that you have longer time to excite it. But it is on a very short scale, like Okay.

Melissa: 08:36

Smaller than nanoseconds. Very, very short scale.

Jam: 08:39

So it's just happening over and over then in that case? Oh.

Melissa: 08:42

And there's lots of electrons that are being excited coming started coming back down. Okay. Some are coming up. Some are coming down. I don't have intimate knowledge about electrons because I've never shrunk down to the size of an electron to be there, but that is my understanding.

Jam: 08:55

Are they friendly? Or Yeah. I wish I

Melissa: 08:58

it would be incredible As a chemist, to be able to be shrunk down to the size of electron and just look. Because we know a lot, and we have all kinds of different models of how electrons move. And, Really, they're constantly in motion, and they're in a cloud and

Jam: 09:12

Mhmm.

Melissa: 09:13

Of possibility of where they could be. And sometimes they can go from one place to another Even though they have no possibility of being anywhere in between, it's amazing. Yeah. I wish I could just get down on that level And see what was going on.

Jam: 09:26

That's some Magic School Bus stuff right there. Like, they did that stuff, which, obviously, they're like it's just a show, but it it it would be so helpful Mhmm. To do that or just to have somebody with the nod that we do have to just go ahead and make some illustrations like that or make some sort of And maybe they actually did do that It

Melissa: 09:42

would be helpful. On that show. I don't know if they've done if anyone's made illustrations of that, but electrons are just very interesting. Yeah. They drive all of organic chemistry.

Melissa: 09:53

But so we know we can make best guesses based on experimental data that we do have about the way that they move and act. Uh-huh. But I would say we're not no one can be a 100% sure because we've not dug in. So we know a lot about them. Mhmm.

Melissa: 10:09

But we don't know Everything. Again, that's the theme of today's episode. Yeah. Okay. So in our research, we worked on making molecules that That were improved in 3 ways.

Jam: 10:21

Okay.

Melissa: 10:21

So one, they could absorb all of the sun's energy.

Jam: 10:24

Okay.

Melissa: 10:25

We talked about the Electromagnetic spectrum and how there's this visible light section, and there's UV also. A lot of that comes from the sun. So if you can have an antenna, as it were, that can absorb energy from all over the spectrum of light that the sun gives off. Mhmm. You're going to be a more efficient harvester of the sunlight.

Jam: 10:50

Got it.

Melissa: 10:51

So that was really what I worked on was Expanding the area on which the sun could be absorbed the sun's light could be absorbed. The second thing we do is what we just talked about that we want the electrons to get excited very quickly And stay excited for as long as possible before relaxing back down to the ground state. It's called the excited state and the ground state. So there's a maximum opportunity to harvest their energy.

Jam: 11:21

Got it.

Melissa: 11:23

So that was that's the basics of what I did my research on And the basics of how solar cells work. Uh-huh. What happens after the energy is excited is it's harvested and stored. Uh-huh. And I worked very little on that part of solar cells.

Melissa: 11:38

I basically built organic molecules that could absorb the sun and a sun's energy and gave them to someone else to work on turning them into solar cells. But my understanding is that the harvesting of the energy at this time is not The limiting factor in turning just everything into solar panels? Uh-huh. Actually, it's hard to store solar energy.

Jam: 12:03

Interesting.

Melissa: 12:03

So I don't again, I'm not gonna batteries that part.

Jam: 12:07

That they try to, like, have charging charge up with the solar energy Mhmm. Aren't great or just they're inefficient or something like that?

Melissa: 12:14

I think it's hard to be able to store them in the quantities you would need to fuel massive amounts.

Jam: 12:21

Right.

Melissa: 12:23

So I did not do research to confirm this, but, anecdotally, I was told by someone who lives in California Mhmm. That, actually, they will turn off the solar farms when they're producing too much energy because It's easier to turn off the solar farms than it is to turn off the fuel burning energy hubs.

Jam: 12:44

Oh, interesting.

Melissa: 12:46

So Those can be stored and relied upon all the time because we can always store fuel. Mhmm. Whereas solar energy is essentially only usable when it's Not needing to be stored in mass quantities

Jam: 12:59

Got it.

Melissa: 12:59

When it's actively providing energy.

Jam: 13:02

Okay. So it's converted is it pretty quickly converted into, like, what we Blanket no is electricity?

Melissa: 13:08

That is my understanding. Yes.

Jam: 13:10

Okay. So

Melissa: 13:10

just it's just just storing industry.

Jam: 13:13

Right. So Storing electricity in batteries is the limiting thing.

Melissa: 13:18

Yes. We don't have a good method. Yes.

Jam: 13:20

Okay.

Melissa: 13:21

And maybe I can look into more of that and give you some of the problems of in the future, but it is a pretty complex problem. So Yeah. I don't wanna get into that. There are other people who are doing Research to understand more about how photosynthesis works by looking at the plants. Mhmm.

Melissa: 13:35

Whereas we are basically designing these molecules so that we can Imitates how plants work and learn more about the transfer of electrons and how to optimize that without looking at the plants themselves.

Jam: 13:49

Yeah. Even just as a regular Joe, I would say that my perspective is that solar stuff has increased a lot even if it's not perfect still. Mhmm.

Melissa: 13:58

We're just

Jam: 13:58

still just trying to mimic and stuff.

Melissa: 13:59

Yeah.

Jam: 14:00

It's become much more everyday Yes. In my lifetime, obviously.

Melissa: 14:04

Absolutely.

Jam: 14:05

Especially in a way that's Kinda cool. Like Mhmm. It's not perfect yet, but to a lot of us, it's like, woah. It's sweet. I have this thing that can charge my phone.

Jam: 14:13

It's solar. Yes. Like, I used solar panel Unfolding solar panel things to charge camera batteries with my previous job when I was out in the middle of nowhere Mhmm. In Africa or wherever. Yeah.

Jam: 14:24

So it's already super helpful

Melissa: 14:26

Yes.

Jam: 14:26

Even if it's not perfect. So that's kinda mind blowing. It's kinda cool that we're already learning that much even if It could be way, way, way better in the future.

Melissa: 14:34

Well and usually, when whenever I give my presentation, for example, for my research, I'd always start by saying There are other types of energy, but our world energy demand is always growing.

Jam: 14:45

Mhmm.

Melissa: 14:46

And we have nonrenewable resources, but Current solar panels are using some heavy metals that aren't incredibly safe.

Jam: 14:54

Mhmm.

Melissa: 14:54

They're basically being produced by methods that are nonrenewable Even though once they're made, they can harvest a renewable energy source.

Jam: 15:01

Mhmm.

Melissa: 15:02

The making of the solar panels isn't optimal.

Jam: 15:07

Okay.

Melissa: 15:07

And there are a lot of places that cannot use an energy grid. So up in really mountainous regions are really remote places. It would be insanely ineffective to build a grid out to those places.

Jam: 15:18

Right. Right. Right.

Melissa: 15:20

So, actually, There's a book that my sister shared with me called Drawdown.

Jam: 15:25

Mhmm.

Melissa: 15:25

And that book showed that they are currently giving Solar panels that are independently functioning to families in the mountainous regions of Bolivia Mhmm. So that they can Basically, have an improved standard of living.

Jam: 15:40

Yeah.

Melissa: 15:41

They would never be able to get on a grid all the way up there.

Jam: 15:43

Right.

Melissa: 15:44

So solar panels have the power to really Change a lot about the way that the world is right now. And if we just harvest this sense energy, there's some crazy statistic. I gotta look it up. It's amazing. Okay.

Melissa: 16:05

Okay. I believe the statistic is that if we could harvest the amount of energy, a 100% harvest the amount of energy that Hits the earth, in 1 hour, you can power the earth for a year.

Jam: 16:20

Oh my gosh. All the

Melissa: 16:21

world's energy demands for a year. That might not be it exactly, but it is close to that. There's a similar one, I think, that says all of the sunlight that hits the Sahara Desert for 3 hours

Jam: 16:33

Yeah. Would power theirs or engineer demands for a year. That's crazy. Even if

Melissa: 16:37

it's not much power.

Jam: 16:38

Yeah. Even if that if that's not perfectly accurate, It helps me understand, like, the level of potential is so high Mhmm. Which I think I've always hoped that was the case because just the idea of harnessing Energy from the sun is so cool. Yeah. It's like, wow.

Jam: 16:53

That sounds perfect. Let's do it. Like Yeah. It's I mean, we have a reliable Scheduled, the sun keeps pretty much. Uh-huh.

Jam: 17:01

We keep, I guess, really, the earth keeps. Whereas, like, other things like wind, energy, or whatever, Those can be temperamental.

Melissa: 17:07

Very intermittent. Yeah.

Jam: 17:08

One thing I thought of when you're talking about remote solutions for power Mhmm. When we were in New Zealand, There's an area called Milford Sound. It's really, really famous. It's a it's a really sharply cut, narrow glacier cut, kinda bay thing. And it's remote enough.

Jam: 17:26

To even get there for a long time was really hard. Mhmm. They finally made a tunnel, but the roads are treacherous. You have to close them a lot. But the people who work in that area for doing, like, boat tours or hotels or whatever, they have to live there, basically.

Melissa: 17:39

Right.

Jam: 17:39

And there's no way to get a power grid out there. It would not be worth it at all.

Melissa: 17:43

Exactly.

Jam: 17:44

They actually do all their power for that little town off of a a waterfall, and stream right near there that they have a, you know, whatever you call that, That it it spins a turbine or whatever?

Melissa: 17:58

I believe it's hydro fuel.

Jam: 18:00

Hydro fuel.

Melissa: 18:00

And title.

Jam: 18:02

It powers the whole little community, which is crazy. And I didn't really think about it, but I yeah. Yeah. There were no power lines on the way. And When on the way back, I was looking, and it took us forever to ever see any power lines again.

Jam: 18:16

So it's like it's not just off the grid a little bit Because it's behind a mountain. It's way out, so it's fascinating.

Melissa: 18:24

That is amazing. Yeah.

Jam: 18:25

Obviously, it's a different kind of power, but I was thinking about that with the Remoteness thing that you're talking about.

Melissa: 18:30

Well and that is the really cool things about solar energy is that it's renewable with a ton of power. It can be very Cost effective. That book also told a story that businesses who went beyond what they were supposed to in terms of their Emissions, greenhouse gas emissions were fined, and they use those fines to pay to put solar panels in low income areas in California.

Jam: 18:55

Nice.

Melissa: 18:55

And then those families bills went down significantly

Jam: 18:59

Mhmm.

Melissa: 18:59

Being very cost effective once you install the solar panels. And very widely distributable off the grid and, obviously, more environmentally friendly than burning fuel. So Yeah. That is the really cool thing about solar energy, and it's really fun to know that I got to be a part of the process of optimizing it.

Jam: 19:18

Mhmm.

Melissa: 19:19

On that note, do you wanna hear a cool story about my friend, E?

Jam: 19:23

Yes. Absolutely.

Melissa: 19:25

My friend, E, she is a friend of the podcast. She's a colleague that I run things by often.

Jam: 19:31

Uh-huh.

Melissa: 19:32

She defended her PhD and now as a doctor, Doctor e?

Jam: 19:38

Does she make you call her that? No? No.

Melissa: 19:40

Her last name is Hu, so She's doctor who? Woah. I know. I know. The same way?

Melissa: 19:47

No.

Jam: 19:48

Okay. I didn't think it would be. But

Melissa: 19:50

So she defended her Dissertation recently, and it was so fascinating because she actually built a new class of compounds that if it can be optimized properly and Converted for use in solar cells could change a lot about the way solar cells are made in the future. Yeah. She did Incredibly interesting work building a molecule and then tweaking it so that it could absorb more energy on the sun Uh-huh. That People thought it wasn't really possible to build. Uh-huh.

Melissa: 20:23

And she did it. Uh-huh. She went to a conference and presented it, and they told her they didn't believe her even though she had proof. Uh-huh. So she went back and essentially grew it's called growing crystals.

Melissa: 20:34

If you've ever made rock candy, it's the same idea, but it's Much more complicated with molecules Uh-huh. That are that big. But grew crystals so that someone could do basically an X-ray of the crystal improve beyond the shadow of the doubt that she made the thing she made

Jam: 20:48

Wow.

Melissa: 20:49

Which she did, and now they all have to believe her. Nice.

Jam: 20:52

So she just told them, what's up?

Melissa: 20:54

Mhmm.

Jam: 20:54

She's like, I'm sorry. Check out these crystals.

Melissa: 20:57

She didn't say exactly like that.

Jam: 20:59

Mhmm.

Melissa: 21:00

I would have surely been, like, in your face.

Jam: 21:03

Yeah.

Melissa: 21:03

But I was like that for her. I was so excited that she she did it. I thought, that's amazing. She did something so hard that Other people who work on the same type of chemistry had a hard time knowing she did it.

Jam: 21:17

Yeah.

Melissa: 21:18

And it had very good results in terms of the efficiency for solar cells. So that was a really cool thing to get to witness and be a part of. So congratulations, e for becoming a doctor and and contributing so well to the field.

Jam: 21:32

That is awesome.

Melissa: 21:33

That's it. That's the basics of how solar cells work and the type of research I did when I was working on my master's degree.

Jam: 21:42

Okay. So the sun.

Melissa: 21:44

Yes.

Jam: 21:45

It's spitting out its light and energy and all kinds of things That which we can see, like light Mhmm. And things we cannot see, like UV Mhmm. Spitting it out all over the solar system in every direction Mhmm. Which is nice, and it hits our planet for the part that we're on for half of a day.

Melissa: 22:06

Mhmm.

Jam: 22:07

And If we have a solar cell or like a plant

Melissa: 22:12

Right.

Jam: 22:13

That is able to have in a solar cell situation, it has Some element some, molecules you guys have been able to

Melissa: 22:22

Molecule. Yes.

Jam: 22:23

Pack together?

Melissa: 22:24

Definitely don't say element because that's 1

Jam: 22:27

Right.

Melissa: 22:28

Substance on a periodic table.

Jam: 22:29

Yes. So a molecule

Melissa: 22:31

A molecule.

Jam: 22:32

That, when the sun hits it, The light and the rays and the energy from the sun are hitting it.

Melissa: 22:39

Mhmm.

Jam: 22:39

It excites the electrons in that molecule.

Melissa: 22:44

Mhmm.

Jam: 22:45

And that excitement is the taking in of the energy Mhmm. That's hitting it.

Melissa: 22:51

Right.

Jam: 22:52

And then from there, that energy is becomes electricity

Melissa: 22:56

Mhmm.

Jam: 22:57

And, load willing, stored in some battery capacity or whatever.

Melissa: 23:03

Right.

Jam: 23:03

Or in a plant, It is as food for the plant.

Melissa: 23:07

Yeah. So I think in a plant, I don't think it becomes electricity the way we think of it. It's just the energy is captured and stored. They use that energy to make sugars or carbohydrates or whatever. Yeah.

Melissa: 23:19

But that's a really great explanation and understanding.

Jam: 23:22

And the work you did was to improve solar cells in the 3 ways, which were hoping to broaden the amount of energy that can be captured by the sun, so not just like a narrow, on the spectrum.

Melissa: 23:37

Mhmm.

Jam: 23:37

Trying to widen that as much as possible so that Right. As as much of a range, kinda like trying to get a bigger fire hose or something like that Right. Rather than a small garden hose.

Melissa: 23:46

Right.

Jam: 23:47

So you can widen it and just capture as much as you you can. And then also, improving how quickly the electrons in those solar cells can get excited. Mhmm. And then how long they can stay excited. Yeah.

Jam: 24:03

And all those things combined would improve how much Electricity we can get from the sun? Right. Dude, that's kind of crazy.

Melissa: 24:12

And then we need to work on doing what plants do where they Take the energy

Jam: 24:16

Store it.

Melissa: 24:16

And store it in nice carbs that we can eat.

Jam: 24:19

So what's interesting to me about that is I've all as a user, I've known that batteries aren't great great, and Like, we're trying to improve them. So it's like like, whether it's as simple as, like, oh, man. The remote is out of batteries again Mhmm. On your TV, like, Bloomberg Kids. Or, like, Now our phones I mean, even though they get better, it's like, oh, my phone's dying.

Melissa: 24:37

Mhmm.

Jam: 24:38

So I've known, I guess, that batteries aren't, like, Perfect yet. Mhmm. You know? But thinking of that, it didn't really occur to me that with the whole solar panels, solar cells system, That one of the biggest areas in need of improvement would be just how to store the energy better.

Melissa: 24:55

Yeah.

Jam: 24:55

That just didn't occur to me before.

Melissa: 24:57

It's very interest I am fascinated by All of that process and how we are working to move away from nonrenewable Energy resources towards renewable energy resources and what the challenges are, and it's just been a long storied, very interesting process. You got it. That was a great explanation. So if just for you guys to look at on the Social media. I'm gonna put some pictures of a molecule that I actually made that does this.

Melissa: 25:31

It's beautiful. It's red. It's shiny and metallic. And when it's dissolved in liquid, it is this great teal color.

Jam: 25:38

Interesting.

Melissa: 25:39

You can even see it absorbs energy and then emits energy back out as a different color, so that's really cool. So I'll post some pictures of that just so you guys can see what I actually made in the lab. But that's pretty much it. Do you wanna say something that made you happy today, Jim?

Jam: 25:56

Yes. So, What made me happy today is or this week or whatever, we just had a Friendsgiving gathering. Yeah. Which was really fun. Had some awesome food.

Melissa: 26:09

Oh, yeah. Very good food.

Jam: 26:11

It's it's great when a lot of your friends are good at cooking or baking or whatever.

Melissa: 26:15

Mhmm.

Jam: 26:16

You you should wanna spend time with them anyway in some capacity. But When it comes down to something like a Friendsgiving meal Mhmm. Potluck, wherever he brings something, it's definitely nice to have buddied up with friends who Can cook well.

Melissa: 26:32

Oh, yeah.

Jam: 26:33

That was really fun. Really enjoyable. Fun. I'm gonna be dreaming about that meal for a while.

Melissa: 26:38

Yeah. There was, the brussels sprouts were good. The carrots were good.

Jam: 26:42

Mhmm.

Melissa: 26:42

The corn was good.

Jam: 26:43

The corn thing, the sweet potatoes.

Melissa: 26:45

Oh, the ro roast beef.

Jam: 26:46

Yes.

Melissa: 26:47

There was in your traditional. We had turkey. Yeah. Jam's wife makes a very good turkey.

Jam: 26:52

She really does. She's it was great. Every time I like it's nice to have something like that that you only have Once a year because then you really look forward to it.

Melissa: 26:59

Yeah.

Jam: 27:00

And it really hit the spot.

Melissa: 27:01

Yeah. It was great. Can that be my thing I'm happy for too?

Jam: 27:04

I think so. It feels like If you don't choose the same thing, then whatever you say, unless it's really, really cool, won't be as cool as delicious sounding is this? So

Melissa: 27:14

Well, I'll how about I say that's my number 1.

Jam: 27:17

Okay.

Melissa: 27:18

But as a number 2 Uh-huh. I am about to be finished with the project that I was working on while you're in New Zealand. Uh-huh. And I'm ahead of schedule. I have never been this ahead on anything ever except my master's thesis and presentation.

Melissa: 27:33

Uh-huh. But I'm gonna do the presentation in about 24 hours, and then I'll be finished. And that will just be a very large weight lifted off of me because it's 50% of my final grade. So

Jam: 27:45

my gosh. That's awesome.

Melissa: 27:46

I'm very excited about that, but also about Friendsgiving. That was something that really warmed my heart in a Special way.

Jam: 27:53

Yeah. Yeah. And I used some chemistry to make some wassel. I tried to use all my chemistry knowledge, Put it in channeled it into some wassail.

Melissa: 28:03

Yes. Anna Vrinsam prompted a whole conversation about Our show

Jam: 28:08

Uh-huh. Yeah. He

Melissa: 28:08

did. He was making mashed potatoes.

Jam: 28:11

Yeah. He started talking about salt in water and how it affects boiling and all that stuff, which is in a previous episode, if you haven't listened to, go listen to why did my pot never boil.

Melissa: 28:21

And then Jam gave a quick science lesson in the middle of the Friendsgiving kitchen. So True. Yeah.

Jam: 28:26

Sounds like this is an opportunity to prove that I learned and retained this information.

Melissa: 28:31

And to get others excited.

Jam: 28:32

Yeah. Absolutely.

Melissa: 28:33

That was really fun. Well, thank you so much, Jam, for learning.

Jam: 28:37

Anytime.

Melissa: 28:38

And thank all of you guys for listening. And I'd like to thank also my references this week. I primarily use prior knowledge, but I did use information from drawdown by Paul Hawken.

Jam: 28:53

Mhmm.

Melissa: 28:54

And then

Jam: 28:56

it

Melissa: 28:56

is not quantifiable, but by the vast number of interactions that I've had with Scientists who are experts in this field over the course of my time working in it. So that's hard to put a reference to. Yeah. But that is the Primary source for my information.

Jam: 29:12

Got it. And you're referencing your own document as well, which is prior knowledge, but your own, like

Melissa: 29:17

Oh, that's true. I did use my own Thesis Yeah.

Jam: 29:21

Yeah.

Melissa: 29:22

And to refer back to.

Jam: 29:23

Yeah.

Melissa: 29:24

That sounds fun and weird, but I did do that. I looked at it. So So those are all the references that I used this week.

Jam: 29:32

Melissa and I have a lot of other ideas for topics of chemistry in everyday life, but we wanna hear from you. So if you have questions or ideas, you can reach out to us on Gmail, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook at chem for your life. That's Kim, f o r, your life, to share a 1,000 ideas. If you enjoy this podcast, you should tell 1 of your friends about this podcast today. Just 1.

Jam: 29:51

And if everybody did that, we'd actually kinda double In just one day. But And that

Melissa: 29:55

would help us share chemistry with even more people.

Jam: 29:58

Absolutely. And that's the goal.

Melissa: 29:59

This episode of chemistry for your life was created by Melissa Collini and Jame Robinson. Jame Robinson is our producer, and we'd like to give a special thanks to a Collini and in Newell who reviewed this episode.