Spire Corporation (NASDAQ: SPIR) has received a $600,000 contract from NASA’s John Glenn Research Center in Cleveland, Ohio to further develop a new type of thermo photovoltaic, TPV cell that produces electricity from heat. TPV cells have potential applications for NASA to generate electricity from heat produced by radioisotope sources for long duration space missions. Commercial applications of TPV cells include electricity generation using heat from combustion.
The work will be carried out in part at Bandwidth Semiconductor, a Spire subsidiary. Bandwidth already offers GaAs concentrator PV cells for converting the sun’s energy to electricity. These TPV cells use InGaAs, a variation of GaAs. Bandwidth Semiconductor has over ten years experience providing similar TPV cells to customers for special applications.
Bandwidth Semiconductor is a compound semiconductor foundry, specializing in wafer epitaxy, thick and thin film products and device fabrication for defense, biomedical, telecommunications and consumer markets.
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