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Kidney Cells Make Implantable Power Source
Galactic_grub writes "New Scientist has an interesting round-up of patents related to green power technology. The ideas mentioned include an implantable power source made from stacks of kidney cells that could drive implanted devices like pacemakers, a chemical way to purifying hydrogen, a buckyball-based filter for methane fuel cells and an organism that turns grass cuttings (and other bio-waste) into ethanol."
1. An apparatus comprising: at least one cell culture chamber wherein live neurons are maintained and grown; and a means for harnessing the thoughts and ideas generated by the live neurons, said means being connected with said neuron culture chamber.
Recalling a time when a working example of the device to be patented had to be presented.
CC.
TaijiQuan (Huang, 5 loosenings)
Green kidneys and stuffed to the eyeballs with grass mulch? No wonder this guy is sick and needs implants. He's lucky he's not dead yet.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
The faster we switch ethanol production over to cellulose, the better. It would mean that we're not cannibalizing our food supply to make it, and the cost wouldn't be tied to the rising price of corn.
Making our ethanol out of the leftover waste materials is probably the only way ethanol will ever take off in this country.
Alchemist: Be Thou For the People
NewslilySocial News. No lolcats allowed.
Do they run Linux?
Speedy thing goes in; speedy thing comes out.
will the technologies be developed in time? Or will the fuel crisis win out and send humanity to the brink of doom?
Tune in next week for the thrilling conclusion!
One more reason for them to steal my kidneys if I ever go to Mexico.
Self proclaimed typo king, and inventor of the bear destroying coffee table (patent not pending).
Interesting, but this is worth far more badass points at the retirement community.
Lets see what we can deduce about the poster above:
1. not fat, otherwise it would be a very hypocritical post
2. doesn't smoke, so same as #1
3. his parents didn't love him, otherwise he might be less of a dick
4. barely graduated from high school, otherwise he might have a larger vocabulary
5. must I list any more, its this kind of person who's the real "fucktarded" one... jeez i sound dumb just making fun of the use of that non-word
the vast raw power of irrationally ultranegative trolls
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
- We are getting closer and closer to functional AI.
- Humans are a source of energy.
- I will enjoy watching you die, Mr. Anderson
Wait... that's not how it was supposed to happen!Starring Keanu Reeves as the elite-hacker Kidneyo.
Just a note about the fullerene filters mentioned in the article, they do not filter methane they filter Methanol specifically they prevent Methanol from diffusing across the memebrane of the fuel cell thus decreasing the amount of Methanol that is wasted.
Sigs are too short to say anything truly profound so read the above post instead.
Duracell Green is people!
So just let the fucktards with the fucking weak genes eat god-damned fucking shit and fucking die...
Another plus of that is there will be no fucking shitdot sheeple to fucking post anymore.
GO AHEAD FUCKING FLAME AWAY OR WASTE YOUR GODDAMNED MODPOINTS FUCKTARDED SHITDOT SHEEPLE!
Translation: "People with medical problems are genetically inferior to members of the master race, like myself, so they should die out. But unfortunately this important fact will never be known, because the other slashdot users all have medical problems and don't want the Truth to be known!"
This troll seems to be new, so your trollfu has been rated on the following categories:
Batshit insanity: +10 trollfu points
Maximum moderation level: 0 (+0 trollfu)
Number of replies: 3 (+3 trollfu)
Number of non-anonymous replies: 1 (+5 trollfu)
Current moderation level: -1 (-1 trollfu)
Chance of post being mistaken for being "informative" or "insightful": none (-100 trollfu)
Final rating: -93
Comments: YUO TROLLING = AWFUL!
To improve your trollfu for next time, why not try disguising your post as a serious point about the healthcare industry? You can basically say the same things, but if you present your claims in the right way, you might trick someone into modding you up. The best trolls don't look like trolls. Try rereading some classics like ATTN: SWITCHEURS and see how they masquerade as real posts.
Summary: Fucktard
These are all interesting and valuable technologies for extracting and using energy. But of course they all consume some of the energy they help produce and deliver. Making that delivery system less efficient in order to use it at all.
But existing fuels have the same problem. Is there anywhere that shows how much energy is consumed by extracting petroleum from the ground, getting it to a ship or pipeline, refined into products, then across to where it's burned for power? How much gasoline is burned driving to a gas station to fill up? How about the energy required to build and maintain the infrastructure, or even explore for new fields? Some of these losses are small, but they all add up. How about for coal and natural gas?
Once we know the "energy budget" of each kind of energy system, we can actually make sensible choices. Gasoline has some of the highest energy density of any fuel, but its pollution has extremely high energy costs to recover from. Maybe some of these other systems are better net propositions. Or maybe they just look good on TV, until you see all the costs that actually goes into using them.
--
make install -not war
Sure, but in areas like that you're going to see a lot better returns on solar power than areas with high rainfall will. In that respect, this sort of technology will be a complement to solar power. In other words, areas with lots of rain and cloud cover will have more available biomass for fuel, whereas areas without the rainfall will see much more output from solar generators. Ideally, it should balance out, although in actual practice it will certainly be more messy than that.
No, kidney cells were patented in 1874 by I.P. Freelie.
-mcgrew
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
So you're going to give up part of your kidney for a pacemaker or insulin pump? When they've already solved the rejection problems in far less invasive ways?
I'm not sure what a host's body rejecting an implantable device has to do with biobatteries. As you've said, rejection of the device can be deterred in other ways. It's more likely that biobatteries are being developed so that an otherwise-functional implantable device won't have to be replaced several times over a host's lifetime just because its batteries have been depleted.
That type of surgery is hard on a host. For example, for the last twenty years, my father has needed a pacemaker to regulate his bradycardia (extremely slow heartrate). In that time, he has undergone three pacemaker replacements, all due to depleted batteries. As he gets older, these procedures have taken an increasing toll on his health. One of these days, he will be deemed physically unable to recover from one of these procedures and, in essence, he'll only survive as long as his most recently-implanted pacemaker's batteries hold out.
So, I wouldn't say that biobatteries/biogenerators are "dubiously useful". As mentioned in the article, these batteries are self-sustaining and should endure for the host's lifetime. Personally, if Dr. Levinson can produce such a thing, then more power to him.