Discovery and development of affordable renewable energy sources is of paramount importance for the continuous growth of human civilization while minimizing global warming. Converting solar energy to electricity or fuel presents a golden opportunity towards truly accessible, low cost and clean source of energy. Thin film inorganic materials may open up new opportunities in flexible solar cells, wearable technologies and building integrated photovoltaics (BIPV) beyond the traditional (silicon-based) solar panels installed on roof tops and solar farms. Conversion of sunlight into useful chemicals such as O₂ and H₂, enabled by photo(electro)chemical reactions of semiconductor photoelectrodes, also presents a promising opportunity to harvest solar energy. Towards this, we present a collection of selected articles on the recent development of chalcogenide based inorganic materials for solar energy harvesting which were presented at symposium P of the 10th International Conference of Materials and Advanced Technology (ICMAT2019) hosted by MRS-Singapore.

中文翻译：

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在^第十届国际材料与先进技术会议（ICMAT 2019） 研讨会P上发表的研究

负担得起的可再生能源的发现和开发对于人类文明的持续发展同时最大程度地减少全球变暖至关重要。将太阳能转换为电能或燃料为实现真正可获得，低成本和清洁能源提供了千载难逢的机遇。薄膜无机材料可能会为柔性太阳能电池，可穿戴技术以及建筑集成光伏（BIPV）带来新的机遇，这将超越安装在屋顶和太阳能农场的传统（基于硅的）太阳能电池板。将阳光转化为有用的化学物质，例如O ₂和H ₂通过半导体光电极的光（电）化学反应实现的，也提供了收集太阳能的有希望的机会。为此，我们提出了一些精选的文章，介绍了基于硫族化物的无机材料用于太阳能收集的最新发展，这些文章已在新加坡MRS主办的第十届国际材料与先进技术会议（ICMAT2019）的P研讨会上发表。