nanogenerators

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/03/30/future-iphones-charged-heartbeat-experts-say/?test=faces

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  • edited March 2011
    Unfortunately for Dr. Zhang Lin Wang, GIT attorneys are not reasonable people.  I tried to license this technology about three years ago, but was unable to negotiate a mutually beneficial agreement with GIT legal dept.  Resistance was a huge hurdle at the time.  The other big hurdle was that the material was brittle and would wear out too quickly.

    Dr. Zhang is a stand-up guy though.  Hopefully this is an improvement over his product 3 years ago.
  • Guess I should have read the article in it's entirety first.  It looks like he is using a ZnO wire which is different than his previous carbon nanotube-based piezo scavenging system.

    I think power scavenging systems (nanogenerators or otherwise) are the future of power.  Hopefully they will replace the power company in the next ten years.
  • @DirectorX:  I also hope that power scavenging systems will replace the power companies at some point.  I'm equally ardent that 3D printers should replace factories.

    And, while I'm at it, I'd also like a million bucks.  Well, I guess all three of those are fairly plausible...

    ~Ian
  • If you have the right 3D printer you can print yourself a million bucks in coins. :)


  • Power harvesting seems like it has a lot of promise, especially for handheld electronics. I've actually been working on a phone charger that is powered from a standard piezo in my shoe. It just uses a standard PVDF piezo element, which isn't very efficient. Hopefully the ZnO wires mentioned in the article will make this kind of thing much more economical.

    I don't know if power harvesting will ever completely replace the power companies, but they'll definitely play a bigger part in the future. Same with 3d printers and local fablabs.


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