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Viruses Engineered to Construct Batteries

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the living-lightning dept.

An anonymous reader writes "Researchers at MIT have modified the M13 virus to create very small batteries. With the viruses building wires 6 nanometers in diameter, the research team hopes to 'build batteries that range from the size of a grain of rice up to the size of existing hearing-aid batteries.'"

5 of 127 comments (clear)

  1. Dynamic ICs by AnalystX · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I'm more interested in dynamic processors. I wonder how long it would take for a virus to complete in hardware what Transmeta does in software.

  2. Amusing by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    But how much power would the 'rice grain battery' put out?

    1. Re:Amusing by hey! · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Presumably enough to run a very small machine.

      If these machines can be "manufactured" in sufficiently large numbers, perhaps by some self-assembly process, then you have the power source for a swarm of robot ants or termites, which collectively have the power to transform things on a larger scale.

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  3. Animal to Computer Virus? by kartack · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I wonder if they can make a virus that creates a battery could they make one that somehow alters a computer? Could we then see the world's first animal to computer transmission. I hope no one with the kind of technical abilities to do such a thing is actually reading this.

  4. Yahoo article misses a point, see original paper by mapkinase · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I am not solid state physicist, but IMHO, Yahoo News article misses one of major points of the ScienceExpress paper: the virus-based batteries have better quality capacity than the SAME size inorganic material only-based batteries (only anode was virus based, catode was solid inorganic material).

    You do not need to use viruses to produce small batteries, you need them to improve small batteries.

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