The photovoltaic effect can continue to provide voltage and current as long as light continues to fall on the two materials. This current can be used to measure the brightness of the incident light or as a source of power in an electrical circuit, as in a solar power system (see solar cell).
The photovoltaic effect occurs in solar cells. These solar cells are composed of two different types of semiconductors - a p-type and an n-type - that are joined together to create a p-n junction. To read the background on what these semiconductors are and what the junction is, click here.
However, in practice, the vast majority of photovoltaic panels use exclusively sunlight as an energy source. The French physicist Alexandre-Edmond Becquerel was the one who discovered this phenomenon in 1839 while investigating the interaction between light and electricity, thus marking the beginning of the development of photovoltaic technology.
The photovoltaic effect was first discovered in 1839 by Edmond Becquerel. When doing experiments involving wet cells, he noted that the voltage of the cell increased when its silver plates were exposed to the sunlight. The photovoltaic effect occurs in solar cells.
This current can be used to measure the brightness of the incident light or as a source of power in an electrical circuit, as in a solar power system (see solar cell). The photovoltaic effect in a solar cell can be illustrated with an analogy to a child at a slide.
The main distinction is that the term photoelectric effect is now usually used when the electron is ejected out of the material (usually into a vacuum) and photovoltaic effect used when the excited charge carrier is still contained within the material.