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Capacitors to Replace Batteries?
An anonymous reader writes "MIT's Joel Schindall plans to use old technology in a new way with nanotubes.
'We made the connection that perhaps we could take an old product, a capacitor, and use a new technology, nanotechnology, to make that old product in a new way.'
Capacitors contain energy as an electric field of charged particles created by two metal electrodes, and capacitors charge faster and last longer than normal batteries, but the problem is that storage capacity is proportional to the surface area of the battery's electrodes.
MIT researchers solved this by covering the electrodes with millions of nanotubes.
'It's better for the environment, because it allows the user to not worry about replacing his battery,' he says. 'It can be discharged and charged hundreds of thousands of times, essentially lasting longer than the life of the equipment with which it is associated.'"
I'm sick of that bloody rabbit. Now it's going to last forever. Perfect.
Meta will eat itself
Finally... the flux capacitor we've all been looking for!
You implied that a Slashdot comment author has a wife/girlfriend. Please don't. It only makes the inmates restless.
Capacitors also have another difference: they can be (dis)charged extremely quickly. That means you will be able to recharge very quickly (if you have a spiffy charger), but I wouldn't want to drop a capacitor powered cellphone in the toilet.....
10 ?"Hello World" life was simple then
Really, the true test will be if it can handle the load of a Hello Kitty Vibrator.
Whew! This water sure is cold!
The image of nanotubes that they show are almost certainly nanotubes made by chemical vapor deposition (CVD). CVD is cheap, scalable, fairly easy, and found in every semiconductor fab you have ever gone to.
That said, I would not hold my breath
I would, given all that chemical vapor around. Speaking of which, this sounds like a great way of powering my Phantom console running Duke Nukem Forever.
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
A rustic farmer is sitting on his porch. In the distance a "toom toom toom" noise can be heard. A pissed off look crosses the farmer's face as he reaches for his shotgun. He opens the breach of the gun and inserts shells that look distinctly like Energizer batteries. As he looks out over his cornfield, a pair of white ears can be seen serenely sliding above one of the rows. He takes aim and then bolts of lightning lash out of the shotgun towards the stately sliding ears. Drumsticks, drumpieces, and exploded bits of Energizer bunny fly everywhere. A smoking pair of sunglasses lands right at the farmer's feet.
"I jes hate it when rabbits get in ma corn."
well... it is NASA
Collector's Edition
It was a sad, sad time to be Hello Kitty.
Chelloveck
I give up on debugging. From now on, SIGSEGV is a feature.
That's why you're in IT and not marketing.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.