What would you do if you didn’t have to recharge your gadgets?

After decades of testing, consumer electronics companies introduce solar technology that mimics photosynthesis in plants. This allows devices to be charged indoors and in some cases can eliminate batteries altogether.

This new light-harvesting technology is fundamentally different from the crystalline silicon-based panels found on rooftops and solar farms, as well as the amorphous silicon cells in the once-ubiquitous solar-powered calculators. This new technology is based on principles first explored by chemists in the 1960s and developed into working solar cells in the 1980s. Versions of these cells that are rugged enough for consumer applications have so far been accepted for production at the scale required for mainstream adoption.