Posted May 14th 2007 9:54AM by Darren Murph
Filed under: Transportation
It's been a tick since we've heard
details on an emerging
battery technology that promises to
trounce even the best products currently available, but researchers at the Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory have reportedly developed yet another approach to boosting
Li-ion capacity and
stability. The technology is "based on a new material for the positive electrode made of a unique nano-crystalline, layered-composite structure," which allows an active components to provide for charge storage while residing in an inactive components which assists in keeping the risk of explosion low. Current claims are putting the capacity right around "double that of conventional Li-ion cells," and it could be used in a variety of wares from "mobiles, laptops,
pacemakers and defibrillators, or even
hybrid / electric vehicles." Unfortunately, there was no timetable as to when scientists expected said technology to actually be available commercially, so until then, we'll consider this
yet another promise on pause.
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Summary only...
While Fujitsu works overtime in order to boost hard drive capacity by 500-percent in just two years, researchers at the University of Hamburg in Germany are devising a method to move magnetically-stored data around a HDD "a hundred times faster than currently possible." Guido Meier and colleagues are purportedly using "nanosecond pulses of electric current to push magnetic regions along a wire at 110-meters per second," which easily trumps today's method of using comparatively slow spinning discs to access data. Additionally, their vision of the next-generation hard drive will sport fewer mechanical parts in order to lessen the "wear and tear" that existing units face. Notably, the idea behind the creation was actually conjured up by an IBM employee in 2004, but if the Germans crafting the current prototype have anything to say about it, said idea could turn into reality sooner than later.
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