Melanie Gonick

MIT doctoral student Daniel Kraemer, right, and Professor Gang Chen display a prototype of a flat-panel solar-thermoelectric generating device.

With the aid of nanotech materials, scientists have engineered a new way to convert the sun's heat into electricity that is roughly eight times more efficient than previously reported solar thermoelectric devices. 

What's more, the device could be added to existing solar water heaters, giving people a jolt of electricity to power their gadgets along with warm bath water, noted Gang Chen, an engineer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

"We just changed the existing system a little bit," he told me today. "Then we generate electricity and supply hot water."

Chen and colleagues at MIT and Boston College described the technology in a paper published online May 1 in Nature Materials. 

Thermoelectric devices
Solar thermoelectric devices typically involve vast arrays of movable mirrors that track the sun and focus its rays on a small area. In solar thermal power plants, another type of solar energy, the sunlight is focused on tubes that heat fluid inside that is then used to boil water in a conventional steam-turbine generator.

The new system takes advantage of a thermoelectric principle "where when there is a temperature difference across a solid it actually generates a voltage," Chen explained.

He and his colleagues placed a flat heat absorber — a piece of copper coated with a nanostructured material — into in a vacuum so that the "absorbed radiation doesn't have any place to go," Chen said. This forces the absorbed heat to flow along two legs with thermoelectric properties.

The combo generates and harnesses a temperature difference of about 200 degrees Celsius between the interior of the device and the ambient air. That temperature difference is what drives the electricity along the legs, Chen explained.

Solar hot water integration
The device is well suited for integration with solar hot water systems, allowing a quicker payback for the cost of installation, according to the research team.

Solar hot water systems today already consist of a black absorber to heat up water flowing through a copper pipe. 

"Now, what we do instead of directly attaching [the absorber] to a copper pipe, we put on those two legs to take out part of the energy as electricity," Chen said. "The rest goes to hot water, so you now have two-in-one." 

In such a setup, the ambient side of the system is actually the hot water, which at about 60 degrees C is warm enough for a shower. "We can use the additional 140 degrees to get the electricity out," Chen noted. 

Current photovoltaic efficiency is greater than that achieved with this system, so it is not going to replace rooftop solar panels, Chen  noted. But adding to existing solar hot water systems make sense.

"The additional incremental cost of electricity is really cheap," he said. "In fact, according to our modeling it is cheaper than photovoltaics."

More stories on solar energy technologies: 

• GE to build nation's largest solar power plant 
• How serious is space solar power 
• Chicago getting a tower of power – solar power 
• Solar power coming to a store near you 
• Origami boosts solar panel productivity 

John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).

ESO

This picture of the Meathook Galaxy was taken by the Wide Field Imager on the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at La Silla, Chile. This view includes the whole galaxy and the surrounding sky, and clearly shows the asymmetric spiral arms. The longer of the two arms has intense star formation, which is visible here as a pink glow.

Two complementary views of the so-called Meathook Galaxy, released today, show how astronomers are piecing together the history of this lopsided group of stars.

The galaxy, located about 50 million light years away in the southern constellation Volans (The Flying Fish), is recognized for its asymmetrical spiral arms. One is tightly folded in on itself and host to a recent supernova, and the other is dotted with new star formation and extends far out from the nucleus. 

NASA / ESA / ESO

This close-up Hubble view of the Meathook Galaxy focuses on the more compact of its two asymmetric spiral arms as well as the central regions. The spiral arm was the location of a supernova that exploded in 1999. These Hubble observations were made in 2006 in order to study the aftermath of this supernova. Ground-based data from MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope were used to fill out parts of the edges of this image.

The broa- view image above was taken by the Wide Field Imager the MPG/ESO 2.2-meter telescope at La Silla, Chile. It clearly shows the double hook shape that gives NGC 2442, as it the galaxy is officially known, its nickname.

The lopsided appearance is thought to be due to the gravitational interactions of another galaxy, though the culprit remains unknown, the European Space Agency noted in an image advisory. This interaction is probably responsible for an episode of recent star formation, seen as the patches of pink and red, particularly in the longer of the two spiral arms.

These colors come from hydrogen gas in star forming regions, ESA explains. As the powerful radiation of newborn stars excites the gas in the clouds they formed from, it glows in a bright shade of red.

The close-up view from the Hubble Space Telescope focuses on the nucleus of the Meathook and the more compact of its two spiral arms. Not seen in the image is a massive star that exploded at the end of its life in a supernova, witnessed in 1999. By comparing older ground-based observations, previous Hubble images and these made in 2006, astronomers have been able to study the details of the star's violent death. By the time this image was made, the supernova had faded.

John Roach is a contributing writer for msnbc.com. Connect with the Cosmic Log community by hitting the "like" button on the Cosmic Log Facebook page or following msnbc.com's science editor, Alan Boyle, on Twitter (@b0yle).

NASA

Artwork from the 1970s shows an orbital fuel depot for outward-bound spaceships.

Two years ago, retired aerospace executive Norman Augustine headed up a commission that led the White House to scrap NASA's "unexecutable" back-to-the-moon program and focus instead on a step-by-step path to send humans beyond Earth orbit, to an asteroid by 2025, and to the environs of Mars by the 2030s.

Now NASA is nearing the end of the shuttle program, gearing up to mark Thursday's 50th anniversary of U.S. human spaceflight ... and dealing with an uncertain future for human spaceflight. Augustine says NASA is mostly following the short-term prescription he and his colleagues have laid out, but he worries that NASA's long-term future could be a case of deja vu all over again.

In an interview, Augustine told me that NASA could once again face a situation where its budget doesn't match the task it's been given. The current year's $18.45 billion budget is a bit less than last year's, and includes $3 billion for work on a heavy-lift rocket and a spaceship that could eventually go beyond Earth orbit.

NASA

Norman Augustine was chairman of the White House's Review of U.S. Human Spaceflight Plans Committee in 2009.

"I think with regard to this year's budget, the match is reasonable," Augustine said. "But if we're to have a program of the type that we described as attractive in the report that we put out, there's not enough money in the out years to do it. The question is whether we'll add that money in the out years or not. If we don't have it, then we're probably pursuing the wrong program. If we add the money, then this will be the right program, in my judgment."

What does he think it will take?

"Unless that money is increased by about $3 billion a year, real dollars, over what it was at the time we did our study, then this whole thing is very tenuous," he said. "But if that funding is made available ... the path we're on so far is very consistent with what I think most of us would see as a sensible program."

He said NASA already had many of the pieces in place for a sensible space program: The agency is supporting the development of commercial spaceships to service the International Space Station, and that effort is coming along "better than I expected," Augustine said. There'll still be a gap of several years after the shuttle program, during which NASA will have to rely on the Russians to send U.S. astronauts to the space station. But Augustine sees that as unavoidable at this point. NASA just couldn't afford working on the next generation of beyond-orbit spacecraft at the same time it was operating the shuttle program, he said.

Augustine acknowledges that not everyone in the space community agrees with him.

"Some of the veterans and some of my most admired friends — Neil Armstrong, for instance — simply don't think it's a good idea," he said. "Other astronauts do think it's a good idea. But the question is, what are the real choices we have? NASA has a certain amount of money, and we could spend that money transporting astronauts into low Earth orbit, basically forever, or we could turn that mission over to somebody else and let NASA use its money and its talents where I think it should be spent — and that is doing more demanding and more exciting things that the public would like to support, mainly exploring and science. NASA has just got to unload the trucking business, frankly."

Why do it at all?

"Many of the justifications that have been given in the past, I would not agree with. We know that there's a huge positive impact on the economy, and we develop new products ... but I believe these things alone don't justify the human spaceflight program," Augustine said. "The only way you can fully justify the human spaceflight program is in the form of intangibles. That is, great nations do great things. President Kennedy said great nations like to explore. If we don't do these things, others will. Do we want to be a part of it, or do we want to stand back and watch?"

He noted that Americans are generally supportive of the space program, particularly when they find out that it costs roughly 15 cents per person per day. "But one of the problems with the space program is that we need some exciting new things," he said. "The previous plan was 'send us a number of billions of dollars and in 25 years we'll go back to the moon.' That really doesn't inspire anybody."

So what does Augustine think would inspire the public? What's his vision for the next decade or two?

"The ultimate goal — and it depends mostly on money, a little bit on science but mostly on money — would be to go to Mars and have a human landing on Mars," he said. "In the interim, it's very clear that we could dock with an asteroid, we could go to one of the Lagrangian points, we could go to [the Martian moons] Phobos or Deimos, we could circumnavigate Mars, we could orbit Mars. I think there's this whole series of steps we could take, that would let us have some accomplishments along the way. It might include actually going back to the moon, as a sort of way station to go to Mars, but I don't think going back to the moon is an end in itself anymore."

... And one more thing:

"It's my belief that we will eventually have widespread tourism into orbit. ... It's kind of like airlines were in the '30s. They used to be like launch vehicles companies are today. In the '30s, of course, the government guaranteed that airlines could haul the mail and get contracts. Well, if the government will give contracts to these firms, and guarantee to haul fuel into low Earth orbit, put fueling stations up there and so on, I think they can make a business out of this. I think there'll be a commercial business one day — maybe not in my lifetime, but one day not all that far away where tourism will be very prominent."

Is that a vision worth an extra $3 billion a year? Or, if you use the per-person pricing plan, an extra 3 cents a day? Feel free to weigh in with your comments below.

Update for 1:45 p.m. ET May 4: For a different perspective on how the space effort's future is shaping up, check out this Q&A with Apollo 17 commander Gene Cernan, conducted by the Houston Chronicle's Eric Berger. Cernan was critical about NASA's push for spaceflight commercialization last year, and he's still doubtful that the "young entrepreneurs" in the space business can do the job. "I don’t have a lot of confidence in that end of the commercial space spectrum getting us back into orbit any time soon," he said. He's more encouraged to see that the more established aerospace players, such as Boeing, Lockheed Martin and ATK, are becoming interested in the commercial push. He also says that NASA was wrong to turn its back on the back-to-the-moon plan, and that if "we aren’t capable of getting back into space in four or five years, the will just won’t be there."

Paul Spudis, senior staff scientist at the Lunar and Planetary Institute, points to Cernan's remarks as well as Augustine's comments in a posting to his Once and Future Moon blog, titled "Who's Short-Sighted?" Spudis says it's shortsighted not to focus on the moon, which is the closest world available for setting up an extraterrestrial settlement. I should make clear that the shortsightedness Augustine is most concerned about doesn't have to do so much with the back-to-the-moon debate, but with the idea that NASA generally doesn't get the funding to match the exploration task it is given. That's what doomed the Constellation Program, and that's what could doom the "flexible path" to Mars as well.

Update for 2:30 a.m. ET May 10: Here's a tardy tip o' the Log to IEEE for arranging the interview with Augustine, an IEEE Life Fellow and one of the featured personages on a newly launched "IEEE Solutionist" website.

More on the path ahead:

• Which way for NASA? A step-by-step path
• Gallery: Seven out-of-this-world destinations
• Future spaceflight depends on neophytes

You can join the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page or following @b0yle on Twitter. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds. 

Steve Scott

This is a large wind farm in northern Indiana. New findings show that wind patterns where most of the wind energy is produced in North America will be unaffected by global warming for the next 50 years.

As carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases continue to fill the atmosphere, the climate is expected to change. Except, it appears, one key component of the climate — wind patterns — won't all that much, at least for the next 50 years in North America where it matters most for wind energy production.

The finding, based on the output of several regional climate models, could ease concerns about where to erect new turbines and string power lines needed to wring energy from the wind and ship it to the people.

Wind energy currently accounts for about 2 percent of U.S. energy production; though the Department of Energy and wind industry backers say it could generate 20 percent by 2030. To get there will require a build out of infrastructure, a costly investment that requires consistent winds to recoup. 

Wind resource stability
The study, published online Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, is among the first to take a detailed look at the long-term stability of the wind as an energy resource.

"At least for the next 50 years, the wind resource in the regions of greatest wind energy penetration will not move beyond the historical envelope of variability," Indiana University atmospheric scientists Sara Pryor and Rebecca Barthelmie, write in the journal.

"Thus this work suggests that the wind industry can, and will, continue to make a contribution to electricity provision in these regions for at least the next several decades."

Sara Pryor

Results from the Canadian regional climate model show the difference in energy density (power in the wind) between 2041-2062 and 1979-2000. If the grid cell is red the future energy density is higher than the historical values and if it is blue the future energy density is lower than the historical values. Solid squares show differences above 10 percent while the open symbols show changes of plus or minus 5-10 percent. The white grid cells show that the future lies within 5 percent of the historical values.

The areas with continuing high wind density include the northern Great Lakes, eastern New Mexico, southwestern Ohio, western Texas, and several states in northern Mexico, regions which are already sprouting turbines.

The finding is based on climate models, which "are evolving and improving all the time," Pryor noted in a press release about the findings. "So we intend to continue this assessment as new models become available."

Clearing the air
The research could clear out some of the confusion over the links between climate change and variability of the wind. In 2009, for example, Pryor published research showing that wind might be dying down across the U.S., though perhaps not where most wind energy is produced.

A study released this March showed that the world is getting breezier. Understanding whether the planet is getting windier as the climate changes is important not just for generating electricity, but also the frequency and intensity of storms. 

Of course, assurances that wind will keep blowing where turbines are erected to harness it is just one of the hurdles wind energy developers face. Even with a steady fuel source for decades to come, opposition to turbines for everything from aesthetics and noise to their impact on wildlife is likely to continue.

More stories on wind energy 

• Whopper of a wind farm opens off Britain 
• Google invests $100 million in wind energy 
• Mexico looks beyond oil and toward the wind 
• Wind turbines may threaten whooping cranes 
• Wind farm debate splits property owners 
• Flap over wind farm in land of windmills 
• Pickens plan no longer features wind energy 
• Debate swirls as wind power grows rapidly 

Google / DigitalGlobe / GeoEye

This Google Earth image shows Osama bin Laden's triangular compound toward the left side of the frame.

The climax of the Osama drama took place on the ground in Pakistan, but the gutsy military operation would have been impossible to pull off without a web of orbiting satellites.

The proof of that emerged today in accounts of the plan to get Osama bin Laden: Once the CIA and the U.S. military focused in on bin Laden's potential hideout in the Pakistani town of Abbottabad, views from above could be turned into a detailed map of the premises, most likely with the help of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency. The map was so detailed that the operation's planners could build a mockup of the compound for rehearsals.

"The outer features of the compound were studied intensively," John Brennan, the White House's deputy national security adviser for homeland security and counterterrorism, told journalists today.

The Pentagon can draw upon a constellation of military satellites for imagery in a variety of wavelengths, but it also picks up pictures from commercial satellite companies such as GeoEye and DigitalGlobe — the same companies that provide mapping data for websites such as Google Earth. A series of satellite pictures can be used to trace the history of the building site from an empty lot in 2001, to a newly built mansion in 2005, to an even more built-out neighborhood this January. Here's that latest image from DigitalGlobe:

DigitalGlobe via Space.com

An image from DigitalGlobe highlights Osama bin Laden's compound as it appeared on Jan. 15.

Tracking down the precise location of bin Laden's base on satellite imagery occupied the attention of geo-geeks for hours, until the CIA provided the solution to the puzzle. Postings on Ogle Earth and the Google Earth blog trace every step of the hunt. This diagram from the CIA helps you identify the compound on the images above:

CIA

A diagram from the CIA shows the layout of Osama bin Laden's compound in detail.

Once the decision was made to go ahead with the raid, another set of satellites came into play: A space-based military satellite system that provides a secure communication channel between the warfighters in the field and the experts directing the operation from far off. Even President Barack Obama could monitor the action in real time from the White House Situation Room, just as CIA Director Leon Panetta could from the spy agency's headquarters.

Pete Souza / White House

President Barack Obama and other top U.S. government officials receive an update on the mission against Osama bin Laden in the White House Situation Room on Sunday.

The main satellite constellations involved here are the Defense Satellite Communications System, or DSCS-III and the Milstar system. Milstar is of more recent vintage and has more capability for secure communications, but it doesn't offer as much signal bandwidth as DSCS-III. The satellite system links up with communication terminals that are installed at bases on the ground, place on ships stationed offshore, or even carried around by the helicopter raiders. The Navy SEALs who took on the "get Osama" mission typically wear helmet-cams that can send a stream of encrypted video halfway around the world.

These high-tech surveillance and communication tools ultimately provided the U.S. military with a high-tech edge over Osama bin Laden and his supporters, who had to go low-tech to avoid detection. And ironically, it was that very low-techiness that tipped off the CIA: The fact that a million-dollar mansion had no phone lines or Internet links led analysts to suspect that they had the right target in their sights.

More on technology and bin Laden's death:

• DNA, face analysis confirms it was bin Laden
• How the US tracked couriers to bin Laden
• The secret team that killed Osama bin Laden
• Bin Laden's death unites Internet town square
• 'I'm the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid'

Correction for 7:25 p.m. ET: After the initial posting of this item, I added in the factoid about helmet-cams, but in my haste I typed "get Obama" rather than "get Osama" ... which is too bad, because I had double-checked the original item to try to avoid just that sort of mistake. Sorry about the error, and thanks to all those who pointed it out in the comment section below. To make it up to the Navy SEALs, here's a video from NBC News' George Lewis.

You can join the Cosmic Log community by "liking" the log's Facebook page or following @b0yle on Twitter. You can also check out "The Case for Pluto," my book about the controversial dwarf planet and the search for new worlds. 

Christian D. Damsgaard, Thomas Pedersen and Ole Hansen, Technical University of Denmark

A scanning electron microscope image of tiny silicon pillars, used to absorb light. When dotted with the new catalyst and exposed to sunlight, these pillars efficiently generate hydrogen gas from the hydrogen ions liberated by splitting water. Each pillar is approximately two micrometers in diameter.

Scientists have found and tested an abundant and inexpensive catalyst needed to make hydrogen fuel from sunlight and water, a necessary step on the road to the elusive clean, green hydrogen economy. 

The new catalyst — molybdenum sulfide — is an alternative to platinum, an expensive and rare catalyst used to convert single ions of hydrogen split off from water into hydrogen gas. 

"That's the very neat thing here, it is quite inexpensive and abundant," Jens Norskov, a chemical engineer with the Department of Energy's SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory at Stanford University, told me Monday.

The dream of a hydrogen economy stems from the fact that hydrogen is an energy dense and clean fuel — upon combustion, it releases water. The problem is that most hydrogen is produced from natural gas in a process that releases carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas.

Hydrogen producing enzymes
An alternative method is to make hydrogen fuel from sunlight and water. The current process is called photo electrochemical, or PEC, water splitting. When sun hits the PEC cell, the solar energy is absorbed and used for splitting water molecules into hydrogen and oxygen, the DOE explains in a press release.

Progress, however, in the technology has been limited in part by the lack of cheap catalysts that can speed up the generation of hydrogen and oxygen. Platinum works, it's just expensive and rare.

"We would like to have something that is cheaper and more abundant," Norskov said.

His team used a theoretical approach to look for hydrogen producing enzymes, which are natural catalysts, from certain organisms. This led to molybdenum sulfide.

"This actually works quite well," he said. The second part of the research was combining the catalyst with a solar absorber — a chemical solar cell — to capture solar energy.

The absorber was designed by Norskov's colleagues the Technical University of Denmark. It consists of silicon arranged in closely packed pillars, each dotted with tiny clusters of molybdenum sulfide.

When the pillars were exposed to light, hydrogen gas bubbled up as quickly as if the team had used platinum, according to the DOE. A paper describing the research was published last week in Nature Materials.

Splitting water
This breakthrough addresses only one half of problem. The other is actually splitting the water, which Norskov says is the more difficult half. His group and others are working on finding the catalysts and sunlight absorbers to do that half as well. 

Ultimately, this is the type of research that could lead to a clean, green economy. 

"We are not there, let me stress that," Norkov told me. "But we are making progress one step at a time."

Many research teams around the world are working on this. 

For example, a team led by Daniel Nocera at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology reported at a meeting of the American Chemical Society in March on the development of an artificial leaf technology that splits water.

Details on the makeup of the catalysts this team used are being kept a secret until publication in the scientific literature.  

Ultimatley, Norskov said, realizing the goal of the clean, green hydrogen will require "the effort of many groups and the ingenuity of many people to take us there because it is a very hard problem." 

More stories on the hydrogen economy:

• A dream of the hydrogen economy
• Hope, hype and hydrogen 
• Hydrogen tries to catch up in green car race
• Up a tree no more: A real artificial leaf debuts