A General Methodology to Measure the Light-to-Heat Conversion Efficiency of Solid Materials

Abstract

Light-to-heat conversion has been intensively investigated due to the potential applications including photothermal therapy and solar energy harvesting. As a fundamental property of materials, accurate measurement of light-to-heat conversion efficiency (LHCE) is of vital importance in developing advanced materials for photothermal applications. Herein, we report a photothermal and electrothermal equivalence (PEE) method to measure the LHCE of solid materials by simulating the laser heating process with electric heating process. The temperature evolution of samples during electric heating process was firstly measure, enabling us to derive the heat dissipation coefficient by performing a linear fitting at thermal equilibrium. The LHCE of sample can be calculated under laser heating with the consideration of heat dissipation coefficient. The random error of PEE method is about 4% with excellent reproducibility. This method is versatile to measure the LHCE of inorganic nanocrystals, carbon-based materials and organic materials, indicating the applicability of a variety of materials.