Radioactive Diamond Batteries: What would you do with a lifetime of power?

Here is a really interesting article on diamond batteries.
https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/energy/a24050/nuclear-waste-diamond-batteries/

These "batteries" have a half-life of 5,730 years.

Question for the forum:
Assuming that these will eventually be cheap enough for hackers to purchase, what would you guys use these for?

Comments

  • according to the figures provided, one gram of such a battery would provide about 170μW. Or about 50μA at 3.3V. Not exactly a lot but good enough to keep the time using a very low power microcontroller or rtc. I would not expect miracles but I'd love to get hands on one of those to test them myself. Amongst all the fancy next-gen-implant powersources, this one would actually be useful (to a limited extend, given you can obtain it in first place)

  • @ThomasEgi Yeah, they are not high amperage for sure! I would be curious to see how much control over the diamonds shape they have though. Maybe a stack of thin (maybe even radioactive graphene) wafers could yield a more useful wattage and be easier to implant. I wonder too if it was put in thin layers and insulated if you could make a radioactive capacitor that could trickle charge itself? Then you could get higher amperage in short bursts with a long recharge time.

    Haha I keep imagining a large lumpy mound of batteries under someone's skin so they no longer have to charge their smart watch. Mmmm... not feeling that so much.

Sign In or Register to comment.