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Researchers Spray-Paint Batteries Onto Almost Any Surface
Warmlight writes "Rice University researchers have created a type of lithium-ion battery that can be spray-painted onto most surfaces. 'Their batteries, outlined in Scientific Reports (abstract), are made up of five separate layers, each with its own recipe — together measuring just 0.5mm thick. To demonstrate the technique, the team painted batteries onto steel, glass, ceramic tile and even a beer stein.' What do you think this will do for future form-factors? Maybe a form-fitting PipBoy-style device that doesn't weigh 30lbs?"
I was expecting a few minutes at best so storing enough to run LED lights for 6 hours was impressive. The number of charge discharge cycles is a major question. What intrigues me is pairing this with spray on solar cells so you end up with a coating that collects and stores power. Imagine light poles that collect and store power then discharge it at night with no visible wires or solar cells. Also roofing tiles that collect and store energy. The real trick would be getting the life cycle to match solar cells which is actually quite long. Traditional cells wouldn't come close but pairing this with nano technology might make the cells more durable. Either way it's interesting technology. Ultimately though what it's likely to do is create devices that are completely disposable since the batteries are fully intergrated.
There are two very important questions that should have been answered:
1) How much power are the getting from the Beer Stein in the picture.
2) What beer is in the stein.
3) Are they also working on a spray-paintable Peltier cooler so that we can keep our beer cold and our hands warm at the same time?
Great men are almost always bad men--Lord Acton's Corollary
Why is India in such a bad state when there are so many smart Indians?
High difficulty level. I live in Finland which has been called "the least failed state in the world". This is nice and all but anyone trying to improve India is dealing with something like 250 times the population, a thousand languages and cultures (probably an understatement) and a warm climate which will give you a great variety of diseases whenever it feels like it. There's also the whole mutual hate thing with Pakistan.
Given the circumstances India seems like a surprising success to me. I hope they can keep it up.