When the team seeded areas outside the tubes with mouse nerve cells the cells went exploring, sending their threadlike projections into the tubes and even following the curves of helical tunnels, the researchers report in an upcoming ACSNano.
"We are excited by this new invention on transparent solar cells, which applied our recent advances in transparent conducting windows (also published in ACSNano) to fabricate these devices, " said Paul S.Weiss, CNSI director and Fred Kavli Chair in NanoSystems Sciences.