Alta Devices has unveiled a new solar product that is designed to meet the specific needs of UAS that can serve as platforms for cellular and IoT connectivity.

According to Alta, the product, known as AnyLight Solar, combines “breakthrough” solar cell technology with several new inventions to provide features to maximize power, minimize weight, and provide sufficient protection from the harsh environment commonly found in the Earth’s stratosphere.

“Alta Devices recognizes that our aerospace customers need to innovate every aspect of these new and complex aircraft systems,” says Alta Devices CEO, Jian Ding.

“With our new HALE solar solution, they now have one less thing to worry about. This will simplify the design process and significantly reduce the complexity involved in manufacturing these aircraft.”

Alta notes that high altitude long endurance (HALE) UAS that fly at stratospheric levels are an important new aircraft category. This category can include airplanes, airships, and/or balloons that can fly at altitudes of 60,000 feet for extended periods of time.

These aircraft can be used for a number of different purposes, including various types of communication, intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and search and rescue operations. The goal of these aircraft is to fly for years without refueling, which highlights the importance of solar power.

The AnyLight Solar uses “world-record efficiency single junction gallium-arsenide solar cells,” which produces what Alta describes as an “industry-leading power-per-unit-area under high-altitude operating conditions.”

To solve critical challenges related to the mechanical and electrical integration of this technology onto multiple aircraft platforms, Alta says that it has worked closely with its HALE customers.

To protect the solar cells from the extreme UV, ozone and the thermal environment of the stratosphere, while maintaining a smooth, aerodynamic surface, Alta developed a special, lightweight packaging product.

Alta also addressed a number of other challenges, including designing for mechanical stresses and vibration expected during flight, and developing techniques for successful co-curing into lightweight composite structures.

The company says that “optimizing a solar array for an aircraft requires complex configurations that maximize cell packing factor, minimize electrical mismatch and allow the design to utilize maximum surface area for solar.” To understand these requirements, Alta worked with its customers and developed sophisticated module designs that address these issues so that it could provide “an easy-to-integrate solution that maximizes system performance, while reducing the amount of work required during installation.”