More BANG! for your Battery

[rustypup]

Nuclear power has long provided steady energy sources for everything from homes to deep space probes. Now researchers have begun developing a tiny nuclear battery the size of a penny that could provide power in a smaller, lighter, and more efficient package.
<..>
"The radioisotope battery can provide power density that is six orders of magnitude higher than chemical batteries," said Jae Kwon, an electrical and computer engineer at the University of Missouri.
<..>
"The critical part of using a radioactive battery is that when you harvest the energy, part of the radiation energy can damage the lattice structure of the solid semiconductor," Kwon noted.

[Prime]

Wow! I can just see this being sold in shops. /sarcasm

[M1ke]

Rofl - although that's probably safe, I can't ever seeing that making its way into anything.

Imagine getting stopped at an airport for planning to make a nuclear weapon with one of these in your pocket.

[Frozenfireside]

"If you consume...eat lead and then run and hide in nuclear bunker"

[Tribble]

Rofl - although that's probably safe, I can't ever seeing that making its way into anything.

Imagine getting stopped at an airport for planning to make a nuclear weapon with one of these in your pocket.

That was my first thought. Would be cool to have batteries that last a long time though. Perhaps something less hazardous?

[rustypup]

the link refers to to similar tech being used, for a brief spell, in pacemakers... long term effects are still being contested..

they're not referring to weapons grade plutonium here, so no possibility of an actual bang... not only is it even more prohibitively expensive, it is insanely unstable - ie. completely impractical for this sort of application... unless the world really wants ambulatory irradiated zombies shuffling around the place using their x-ray powers to flash-fry braaains!...

[Tribble]

Many of the people I see have zombie like attributes - so I guess we are well on our way already.

[Prime]

You could still make a dirty bomb with enough of them. And as long there is any stigma attached to nuclear, they won't be able to sell them.