title: Absorption and scattering properties of carbon nanohorn-based nanofluids for direct sunlight absorbers.
abstract: In the present work, we investigated the scattering and spectrally resolved absorption properties of nanofluids consisting in aqueous and glycol suspensions of single-wall carbon nanohorns. The characteristics of these nanofluids were evaluated in view of their use as sunlight absorber fluids in a solar device. The observed nanoparticle-induced differences in optical properties appeared promising, leading to a considerably higher sunlight absorption with respect to the pure base fluids. Scattered light was found to be not more than about 5% with respect to the total attenuation of light. Both these effects, together with the possible chemical functionalization of carbon nanohorns, make this new kind of nanofluids very interesting for increasing the overall efficiency of the sunlight exploiting device. PACS: 78.40.Ri, 78.35.+c, 78.67.Bf, 88.40.fh, 88.40.fr, 81.05.U.
authors.affiliation: National Institute of Optics, National Council of Research, Firenze, 50125, Italy. elisa.sani@ino.it.
authors.forename: Luca
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Mercatelli
authors.forename: Elisa
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Sani
authors.forename: Giovanni
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Zaccanti
authors.forename: Fabrizio
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Martelli
authors.forename: Paola
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Di Ninni
authors.forename: Simona
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Barison
authors.forename: Cesare
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pagura
authors.forename: Filippo
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Agresti
authors.forename: David
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Jafrancesco