The increasing demand of energy and the decreasing amount of non-renewable sources have always been concerns of the scientists around the world. From time to time various methods have been developed to use renewable sources of energy. The scientists developed solar panels for converting sunlight into electricity long time back.

But the production of electricity through these solar panels was costlier than electricity produced by other renewable resources. Since than scientists are busy to develop a cost-effective way to use sunlight.

A team led by Marc Balo from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) has developed a cost-effective way to use sunlight. Initially solar concentrators with large mobile mirrors were used to use sunlight as source of electricity. These concentrators were costly and difficult to maintain. But the solar concentrators by MIT team are not costly and easy to handle. These MIT solar concentrators are made by painting a pane of glass or pane with a mixture of two or more dyes.

The main purpose of these dyes is to absorb light across a range of wavelengths, which is then re-emitted at a different wavelength and transported across the pane to waiting solar cells at the edges.

The researchers believe that these new solar-panel systems can increase the efficiency of present solar panels by 50%.The researchers are hopeful that these cost-effective solar panels would be available within three years in the market.

Marc Balo explained the basic concept behind the working of these new cost-effective solar panels. He said "The idea is the light comes in and hits the paint. The paint then bounces the light out to the edges of the glass. All you need is the solar cells on the edges. So we think we can use this to reduce the cost of solar electricity."