In case you missed it, the geniuses at Stanford have created super batteries using carbon nanotube ink and silver nanowires. They basically spread the carbon nanotube/silver goop on paper and it’s ready to store energy. The paper batteries are capable of storing 10 times as much energy by weight as lithium-ion batteries and are conceivably good for 40,000 charge-discharge cycles. From the Stanford article:
“These nanomaterials are special,” [assistant professor Yi] Cui said. “They’re a one-dimensional structure with very small diameters.” The small diameter helps the nanomaterial ink stick strongly to the fibrous paper, making the battery and supercapacitor very durable. The paper supercapacitor may last through 40,000 charge-discharge cycles – at least an order of magnitude more than lithium batteries. The nanomaterials also make ideal conductors because they move electricity along much more efficiently than ordinary conductors, Cui said.
Cui says that the thin, lightweight, flexible batteries could be used in everything from consumer electronics to cars. He also says the technology is basically ready for action. Just a few refinements and the batteries could go into production.
The desert planet of Arrakis, Dune, is a ball of desiccated sand, a place where water is more precious than gold. Wait, no, we’re talking about Australia. Or Dubai. The EVOLUTE toilet concept is designed for parched climates and uses 90 percent less water than conventional toilets.
The toilet ditches the conventional water tank and instead uses a rotating sphere and miserly jets of water. The sphere sits at the base of the bowl. It has a small cup to catch your stuff. Hit the flush and the sphere rotates and dumps the waste down the sewer drain. A small jet of water rinses out the cup and washes down the walls of the bowl. The whole thing is mechanical–no electricity required. It uses less than one liter of water per flush and takes up 30 percent less floor space than a conventional toilet.
It’s a clever design and should be on the market sometime in 2012. But really, I just wanted to mention Arrakis.
The bicycle is nearly perfect—an an efficient and beautiful expression of man and machine. Still, the geniuses at MIT have found a way to improve it. Meet the Copenhagen Wheel, a super-snazzy wheel with a kinetic-energy capture system and built-in electronics to monitor everything from distance to pedaling effort.
The heart of the Copenhagen wheel is a KERS (Kinetic Energy Recovery System). The system captures energy when you slow down, which can then be delivered on demand for a boost of speed. It uses an electric motor and batteries contained within the hub.
The Copenhagen wheel also beams information to the iPhone via Bluetooth, including speed, distance traveled, direction, and even air pollution.
The wheel will be on sale sometime in 2010. From MIT:
The initial prototypes of the Copenhagen Wheel were developed along with company Ducati Energia and the Italian Ministry of the Environment. It is expected that the wheel will go into production next year, with a tag price competitive with that of a standard electric bike. According to Claus Juhl, CEO of Copenhagen, the city might place the first order and use bicycles retrofitted with the Copenhagen Wheel as a substitution for city employee cars as part of the city’s goal to become the world’s first carbon-neutral capital by 2025.
It’s pretty slick. I’d definitely add one to my around-town cruiser, budget permitting.
A team of researchers from UC Berkeley, Switzerland, and Spain, have found that exposure to exhaust fumes thickens arteries and could increase the chances of cardiovascular disease.
The study looked at people in the Los Angeles area who live within 100 meters of a highway. It found that their arteries thickened by 5.5 micrometers – one-twentieth the thickness of a human hair – per year, more than twice the average.
“For the first time, we have shown that air pollution contributes to the early formation of heart disease, known as atherosclerosis, which is connected to nearly half the deaths in Western societies and to a growing proportion of deaths in the rapidly industrializing nations of Asia and Latin America,” said study co-author Michael Jerrett, UC Berkeley associate professor of environmental health sciences. “The implications are that by controlling air pollution from traffic, we may see much larger benefits to public health than we thought previously.”
Even more reason to bring the age of roaring internal-combustion engines to a close. Which is a bummer, because I happen to really like the roar of a Chevy V8 with a lumpy cam. Oh well, bring on the age of humming electric cars!
As an avid Sci-Fi fan, I’ve often wished I could swap DNA with animals to gain their abilities—the speed of a cheetah, the strength of a gorilla, the seal’s ability to hold its breath for 45 minutes. But that’s just a fantasy. Reality is much, much crazier. Scientists have discovered a sea slug that’s stolen DNA and plant cell organelles from algae in order to photosynthesize. For real.
The slug, Elysia chlorotica, gobbles up algae and, through a complex digestive process, nabs chloroplasts. Chloroplasts are the solar power plants of the plant world, cell organelles that use sunlight to convert carbon dioxide into sugars and other organic compounds. The slug traps these little solar-powered factories in its cells and—this is the crazy part—is able to make them work with its own metabolism. That means the slug has at some point nabbed plant DNA so it can use chloroplasts to effectively photosynthesize. It is part plant.
Of course, the snail isn’t born with chloroplasts, but it’s still amazing. According to scientists at the University of South Florida in Tampa, once the slug has gobbled up some chloroplasts, it can sustain itself with photosynthesis alone. It doesn’t have to eat. At all.
Biologists are calling it one of the freakiest discoveries of the century. Sure, they’ve known for quite a while that bacteria can swap DNA, but this is an animal. Unfortunately, they aren’t sure how the snail was able to grab the DNA necessary to support chloroplasts and photosynthesis, but it opens up a new world of possibilities. So, when can I order a shot of bat DNA so I can have echolocation, huh Science?
Wouldn’t it be great if we could suck all the extra C02 out of the atmosphere and turn it back into fuel? Climate change would subside, gas prices would fall, and we’d have a surplus of fuel. Sounds like a dream, but researchers at UCLA might have figured out how to make it a reality.
Bioengineers at the UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science have created a cyanobacteria, or blue-green algae, that can turn C02 into a fuel called isobutanol. Like plants, cyanobacteria use sunlight and C02 as an energy source to grow and prosper. The reachers tweaked a few genes in a strain of cyanobacteria to make it absorb more C02, then added some genes from other organisms to make it produce isobutyraldehyde gas. Smush the bacteria and stir the resulting sludge with an inexpensive catalyst and you get isobutanol, a liquid fuel that can be used like gasoline. Plus, the bacteria could be further modified to produce isobutanol directly without a catalyst.
The new strain of cyanobacteria uses energy from sunlight and C02 in the atmosphere to make the fuel. Researchers say they could grow the bacteria in ponds next to fossil fuel power plants to reclaim some of the emitted C02. Of course, there’s nothing stopping them from growing the cyanobacteria all over the place to help reduce greenhouse gas and provide us with ample fuel for our 1967 Camaros.
Ocean currents never stop flowing. They’re a ceaseless source of energy—if you can harness them. They’re too slow to spin turbines and the ocean tends to wreak havoc on steel and concrete. A team of engineers led by professor Michael Bernitsas at the University of Michigan, however, have discovered a way nab the energy in ocean currents despite these problems.
Their new system, called VIVACE (Vortex Induced Vibrations Aquatic Clean Energy), exploits vibrations that can tear man-made structures apart.
It all has to do with Aeolian Tones. Originally described by Leonardo da Vinci, they’re the ghostly resonating sounds that strings or cables can emit when air passes over them. The vibrations that make those sounds are caused by vortices pushing the cable back and forth. These vibrations can be extremely violent, as seen in the infamous film of the Tacoma Narrows bridge oscillating itself to bits. Engineers typically try to avoid these vibrations when building structures, but Bernitsas is using them in VIVACE. Slow-moving ocean currents crete vortices that are strong enough to push steel tubes up and down, and generate power.
The system is currently being tested and could be ready for deployment in the near future. Bernitsas estimates that the ocean currents could generate enough power for the entire world. His company, Vortex Hydro Energy, plans to have systems on the market soon.
The Pharaohs built the pyramids to thwart time, to survive the elements for eternity. Nearly 4,500 years later they show few signs of erosion and will likely last for generations. Modern buildings, however, barely last a decade without significant maintenance. Thanks to engineers at MIT, that could all change. A team of civil engineers have figured out how to make standard concrete resist the ravages of time for 16,000 years.
It all comes down to “creep.” It’s the technical term for the process that makes cement break down. Basically concrete particles settle into different densities over time, thus cement cracks and crumbles. Professor Franz-Josef Ulm and his team at MIT have figured out how to manipulate concrete at the nano scale to slow creep to a crawl. Using silica fumes, a waste material from aluminum production, they’ve shown they can cut the rate of creep by nearly three times.
That makes extremely dense concrete that, on the short side, can last for more than 100 years without maintenance. The new material is also much stronger than conventional concrete, which means engineers can use less of it in construction. Says Professor Franz-Josef Ulm of MIT:
“The thinner the structure, the more sensitive it is to creep, so up until now, we have been unable to build large-scale lightweight, durable concrete structures,” said Ulm. “With this new understanding of concrete, we could produce filigree: light, elegant, strong structures that will require far less material.”
Using less concrete will also reduce CO2 emissions. Current concrete construction accounts for 2 to 8 percent of worldwide CO2 emissions.
Burning plants for fuel is greener than you think. The logic is this: Burning plants releases CO2, but growing plants locks it back up again. In essence, it’s carbon neutral. But you can’t run a car on firewood. That’s why a group of chemists at the Department of Energy’s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL) have developed a new catalyst that can turn cellulose—the stuff plants are made of—into the key component of biofuel.
The new catalyst, an ionic liquid called chromium chloride, can break cellulose down into simple sugars and then hydroxymethylfurfural (HMF), a big component of fuel and plastic.
The process is ten times faster than the standard acid-based method, and can be performed at much lower temperatures (about 120 degrees C).
It’s possible the catalyst can be used to convert the waste from food crops, like corn husks and wheat chaff and stocks, into carbon neutral fuel for transport or power. That means less fossil fuel burned and less net CO2 in the atmosphere.
