A Tablecloth to Charge Your Laptop

moscowde writes "Research scientists at the University of Tokyo have come up with a unique sheet-like material that can transmit electrical energy over a large area to nearby devices without the need for direct contact, so it can be made into a tablecloth or wallpaper and your appliance can be anywhere on a surface to get charged. The system uses organic molecules as transistors, microelectromechanical switches, and miniature copper coils to transmit energy using electromagnetic induction."

Comments

Tablecloths and wallpapers?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm sure there's nothing harful in wrapping ourselves in yet more electromagnetic fields, not even shielded ones in this case.

I mean, what could possibly go wrong? After all little Jimmy's third arm is quite handy.

Re:different requirements

[tomstdenis]

I dunno, after seeing my friends wrestle with BT all the time [hidd --search, over and over] I'm actually fond of wired devices. Sure I use wifi from time to time but I'd generally much rather cat-5. No hassling with "do I have a good signal" and all that jazz.

Sometimes it's nice to just plug something in and have it work without worrying about the environment.

And sure a power "pad" sounds nice but take into account the power loss. The thing most likely converts AC to DC [power loss], then from DC to EM [power loss], from EM to DC in the device [power loss]. So you'll be burning more energy to get the same amount of work done. Not exactly a step forwards.

Tom

Re:Nothing

[Mythrix]

Eouldn't a magnetic field affect the hard drives and monitors?

And standardisation would definitely be good, so we don't end up having to buy a Sony tablecloth for cellphones, Dell tablecloth for laptops and Philips tablecloth for the toaster.

How efficient is it? In these days...

[Joce640k]

How efficient is it? In these days of global warming the last thing we should be thinking is replacing all those chargers which are left plugged in 24/7 with something that's even less efficient...