RSSMIT Builds Batteries with Viruses
By Ed Oswald | Published April 7, 2006, 12:49 PM
Normally, one would associate the word virus with something negative, whether it is a malfunctioning desktop computer or a sickness. However, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have "trained" viruses in a lab to create a miniature battery.
By manipulating a few genes within the virus, researchers were able to get the organism to grow and then assemble itself into a functional electronic device. They hope to be able to build a battery that could be as small as a grain of rice.
Two opposite electrodes -- or conductors -- form the structure of a battery, called an anode and a cathode. These are separated by something called an electrolyte, a liquid of gel-like substance that contains ions and can conduct electricity.
In the process created by MIT researchers, the viruses were engineered to create the anode by collecting cobalt oxide and gold. Since these viruses have a negative charge, they are then layered between oppositely charged synthetic polymers to create thin sheets.
Batteries made with this process could store two to three times the energy of traditional batteries that size, meaning a longer-lasting charge. While the researchers did not specify any early applications of the technology, it would likely first appear in Defense Department work. The project was funded by the Army Research Office, MIT said.
The group's work is expected to appear in this week's issue of Science.
I thought this was going to be another nano technology breakthrough.. A grain of rice if hardly nano...
anthony
Score: 0
|Question - Do you train viruses thru positive reinforcement? That leads to a new TV show idea - "The Virus Whisperer" Some guy can teach a family to manage its misbehaving virus.
Score: 0
|What would happen if we ate one of these "grains of rice"? Would we become human batteries? Someone should make a movie about this where our AI robots rise up and plug us into a giant computer simulation grid, where the protagonist struggles against they system to save humanity. I know i would get a charge out of watching it.
Does he swallow the red pill or the blue pill? I don't remember.
But this has great potential, imagine injecting someone with a virus and they grow and electrical devise. I wouldn't mind a Phone Trait, though it does add a new dynamic to the entire cell phone radiation problem. Course the DoD could inject pets with wiretap virus's (i've known for years my cat has been spying on me, this clinches it).
Score: 0
|Immiediate applications that come to mind are portable electronic devices: cell phones, pdas, laptop computers. I hope the lag time beteween lab development and commercialization is not too long in this case. It looks like nanotechnology will be the solid state of the 21st century.
Score: 0
|A great article but far too short. This points to the fact that the human body itself is just a big colony of batteries. Humans are no more biological entities than batteries are.
Score: 0
|What is this "by something called an electrolyte" did this reporter sleep through science class or are we being subjected to another case of bad reporting.
Score: 0
|Hope they don't Leak!
Score: 0
|Training viruses??
It is smelling danger.
Score: 0
|Not to be overly pessimistic or anything, but I hope to God they don't end up 'training' another aids virus or worse....
I'm ALL for technology, really - but training viruses and all this just screams "noooo!", playing God so to speak, is never a good idea.
Score: 0
|If it can be done, it will be done. If not here, then elsewhere. By throwing up prohibitions, all we do is remover ourselves from a position to influence dirction and application.
Score: 0
|I can't even train my dog to sit.
Score: 0
|very cool
Score: 0
|"...researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have "trained" viruses in a lab..."
That's the funniest thing I've read all week! That has made my day.
Score: 0
|...and that is funny because?
Score: 0
|"Sit virus, sit! GOOD virus!"
Score: 0
|