Two University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty members — one a textile artist and the other a chemist — have teamed to create fabric solar panels.

Marianne Fairbanks creates textile art and has experimented with wearable solar panels for years. She collaboratively created a bag with a solar panel sewn into the flap.

And after becoming a UW-Madison assistant professor in the human ecology department's design studies program, she wanted to take the idea farther. She reached out to assistant professor of chemistry Trisha Andrew. Her lab has experimented with growing solar cells on various substrates, like paper.