Abstract: Energy conversion among heat or electricity and incandescent light is achieved, in the case of incandescent light emission, with the emission having reduced IR content, using a high band gap semiconductor element that is tailored in structure and in energy conversion physics to suppress free carrier absorption so as to be transparent or reflecting of photon energy that is below the band gap of the semiconductor and to only emit photon energy above the band gap of the semiconductor. A filament of lightly "N" doped 3C-SiC, at about 900 degrees C., will incandesce and radiate in the visible range for energies greater than about 2 eV and will exhibit inefficient emission of photons for energies less than about 2 eV.

Abstract: A technique for fabricating a semiconductor heterostructure by growth of a ternary semiconductor on a binary semiconductor substrate from a melt of the ternary semiconductor containing less than saturation of at least one common ingredient of both the binary and ternary semiconductors wherein in a single temperature step the binary semiconductor substrate is etched, a p-n junction with specific device characteristics is produced in the binary semiconductor substrate by diffusion of a dopant from the melt and a region of the ternary semiconductor of precise conductivity type and thickness is grown by virtue of a change in the melt characteristics when the etched binary semiconductor enters the melt.

Abstract: An efficient converter of photon energy to heat has been devised comprising a dense array of metal whiskers grown with spacings between the whiskers of a few wavelengths of visible light. The material selected, and tungsten is exemplary of such materials, has low emissivity, but achieves significant optical absorption by trapping the light impinging on the dense array by a geometric maze effect. The characteristics of the surface are excellent for the conversion of solar energy to heat.