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An Origami Inspired Bacteria-Powered Battery

Posted by timothy on from the know-when-to-fold-'em dept.

jan_jes writes: Origami is the Japanese art of paper folding created by Akira Yoshizawa, which can be used to create beautiful birds, frogs and other small sculptures. Last year a team of engineers from MIT and Harvard has developed an origami flat-pack robot (YouTube video) which can fold itself and crawl away without any human intervention. But now a Binghamton University engineer says this technique can be applied to building batteries, too. The battery generates power from microbial respiration, delivering enough energy to run a paper-based biosensor with nothing more than a drop of bacteria-containing liquid. This method should be especially useful to anyone working in remote areas with limited resources. The total cost of this potentially game-changing device is "five cents."

5 of 27 comments (clear)

  1. Five cents? by ArcadeMan · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The total cost of this potentially game-changing device is "Five cents".

    Don't worry, the legal and the marketing departments will have that fixed very soon.

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  2. Akira Yoshizawa meet Al Gore by frovingslosh · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Origami is the Japanese art of paper folding created by Akira Yoshizawa

    I find it extremely hard to believe that Akira Yoshizawa, born in 1911, invented Origami. Oh sure, he apparently did a lot of Origami, as did others. But to claim he created the concept is a pretty bold claim.

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  3. False Advertising by Livius · · Score: 2

    The alleged "origami flat-pack robot" had components that weren't paper.

  4. History of origami by __roo · · Score: 4, Informative

    Origami is the Japanese art of paper folding created by Akira Yoshizawa, which can be used to create beautiful birds, frogs and other small sculptures.

    According to that page, Akira Yoshizawa was born in 1911. Origami dates back to at least 1797, when the first known origami book was published (see the history of Origami).

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  5. Expensive by viperidaenz · · Score: 2

    Cost of bacteria battery: $0.05
    Cost of 100 AG13 cells from China: $4.99 or $0.0499 each

    http://www.aliexpress.com/item...

    There are probably cheaper ones out there.

    CR2032's pack a decent amount of power for $0.13c