Multifunctional Concentrator with Integrated Structural Thermal Optical Design

A concentrating photovoltaic system in space must serve multiple functions to achieve superior performance. Benefiting from the high-efficiency triple-junction gallium arsenide (GaAs) photovoltaic (PV) cells, this work aims to design a multifunctional concentrator allowing for collecting solar energy and providing a thermal pathway for waste heat to be conducted away from PV cells. A layer regulation method with an established multi-objective optimization model is adopted to design the concentrator with load-bearing and heat-conduction functions. Then, an integrated structural–thermal–optical analysis procedure based on the topology variables for concentrator is developed. The root mean square error, maximum temperature, and optical efficiency served as quantitative indices to evaluate the comprehensive performance of concentrator. Finally, two spherical cap concentrator design examples are provided for space and ground to show the effectivity and advantages of the proposed method. The simulation results reveal that space-based designs prioritize thermal dissipation under radiative boundary conditions, while ground-based designs emphasize structural rigidity under gravitational loading.