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MIT Secretly Built Mega-Efficient Nano Batteries
mattnyc99 writes "There was plenty of chatter last week about an MIT announcement that researcher Angela Belcher had developed a way to create virus-based nanoscale batteries to power mini gadgets of the future. In a fascinating followup at Popular Mechanics, Belcher now says that her unpublished work includes full-scale models of the batteries themselves, and that they could power everything from cars and laptops to medical devices and wearable armor. Quoting: 'We haven't ruled out cars. That's a lot of amplification. But right now the thing is trying to make the best material possible, and if we get a really great material, then we have to think about how do you scale it.'"
We also hear about research because this is Slashdot: News for Nerds. If you only want to hear about ready-to-use products, go to Best Buy.
I see nothing in those articles about these batteries being "mega efficient", as the title of this Slashdot post screams. The novelty seems to be the fact that they're grown using viruses and can be applied in thin films.
Oh, no, that is not complete story of what this bugs could do. Think about it for a moment:
1. those are big-molecule-sized particle batteries.
2. You can construct them in such a matter that their terminals can be accessed only trough specific shape of (molecular, e.g. an enzyme) connectors.
3. You can make each terminal incompatible with opposite polarity terminal, allowing for suspending those batteries in a liquid, or, if the batteries can bond with each other through (weak) hydrogen bonds, a large mass of them might already be in liquid form.
Now, what is that all together? An "electric fuel", something that might power electric cars, but refuel on pump stations in same time ICE cars refuel. Car would have nanobatteries' processing unit, which would allow parallel connection of great many such batteries, pumped from the "fresh" tank. Once discharged in processor, batteries would be would be pumped into "used" tank.
Bonus points for hypothetical clever battery design that would spoil terminals' shape if battery is empty as it would allow processor to be installed in "fresh" tank and just keep the tank stirred enough. Once processor squeezes out all the "juice", battery should fall off it, allowing connection with another, fresh battery to commence.
"Prototypes" mean something specific to us too.. and it isn't "2 out of 3 critical components, not even integrated yet".
Actually, it can, because they can be prototypes of the components. Two of which have been integrated. And they've made full, working batteries, just not using their cathode technology yet.
Why don't you just RTFA instead of continuing to poo-poo their accomplishment based on a single word taken out of context, the first one you latched onto not even existing in the article? Right, right, I must be new here.
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