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54 Comments
- endersadvocate, on 10/10/2007, -2/+17why didnt they call themselves BioShock??
- Ninnux, on 10/10/2007, -0/+14I met one of the team members while at MIT for a different conference. It's true that the power output isn't great, but the concept scales. This research is part of a much larger branch of bioengineering loosely called metabolic engineering and ties to other research called synthetic biology. Metabolic engineering deals with the optimization of metabolic pathways (i.e. tweaking Gibbs free-energy of enzymes, minimizing rate limiting steps and so forth). Synthetic biology treats genes and their associated products collectively as deterministic systems (i.e. gene A is known to work well with gene B and both A & B do reaction C well, etc.).
The thing is, the electrical engineering is fairly well understood. All we need is a couple more years to optimize the biology. I'm watching this stuff closely. There's huge investment opportunities in this. - zeromancer, on 10/10/2007, -0/+5this is why i like digg. jokes and memes actually die here. on slashdot, the same 7 year old all your base and soviet russia and will it blend (you didn't even ask the right question, btw) jokes get modded +5 funny but people here actually realize they aren't funny. mad love digg.
- zeromancer, on 10/10/2007, -2/+7you're an idiot. if you go to MIT, you're most likely in the top 1/16th percentile of the world as far as brainpower goes. so i don't think they'd be doing it if it didn't have promise. also, what are you doing to improve the environment and/or create an alternative solution to fossil fuels? oh? what's that? nothing? how about a nice big cup of shut the ***** up for the parent.
- bootfail, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I logged in just to say how impressed I am that you didn't say "Jigga Watts."
- apeweek, on 10/10/2007, -0/+4I assume that a 'few months to charge a cellphone battery' means that the output is just a few MA.
If so, how is this different from sticking a couple of coins into a lemon? That's a 'bio-battery' too, and the output is probably higher than this thing. And it costs even less than $2. - CompIsMyRx, on 10/10/2007, -1/+5Rick Roll sucks balls. And shame on you for misleading people.
- siliconentity, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3More info here:
http://dmse.mit.edu/madmec/biovolt.html
http://technology.newscientist.com/channel/tech/dn ... - Battleloser, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3Is this like what the machines used in the Matrix?
- WaterDragon, on 10/11/2007, -0/+3For two dollars, they probably did exactly that. Except they probably used something with less acid, like maybe a ripe orange.
- Ibox, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3any more detail on how it works? sounds good tho.
- dudefather, on 10/10/2007, -1/+4don't harvest my biomass for energy bro!
- cranium, on 10/29/2007, -1/+4If that's how you feel, don't ever touch a computer again, you hypocritical ingrate.
- biggyfred, on 10/10/2007, -2/+5What an exciting time to be alive. I love seeing the movement towards future energy solutions. Innovation marches on.
- SchmidtHappens, on 10/10/2007, -0/+3But how does it work?
- shinynew, on 10/29/2007, -0/+3Twice nothing is still nothing even at MIT
i think you mean nothing doubled is still nothing. - shinynew, on 10/11/2007, -0/+2click the read more link...
As apeweek said it would be cheaper and more efficent to just run off 5000 lemons. - inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2What ever happened to that pee-battery? I take it the idea of using pee for power never really caught on?
- stevenb337, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2They should market it as "Mr. Fusion". That would sell like hotcakes. "Great Scott Marty, I can generate 1.21 Gigawatts with some old coffee grinds and a couple of banana peels!"
- inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2It's been around for a long time it's called a biochemical fuel cell.
- WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -0/+2They would be cool if they took that $5,000 and used it to build 2500 of these devices -- if they really cost only $2 each!
Also, the article tells nothing about the specifics of how such a device wold work (if it actually exists.)
So, it appears to be just more useless sensationalism, as if it was researched and written by a two year old. - WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3I see a continuation of secret assassinations and complete discrediting of new inventors, by the leaders of the current cash-cow energy industry...same as it ever was!
Remember what they did to Tesla! - inactive, on 10/10/2007, -1/+3In the grand scheme of thngs, increasing storage space is not an exciting technological advancement. You can't compare that to the invention of electricity, or the lightbulb, or cars, or airplanes, or even the computer itself. It would be nthing more than a upigrdae. And one that the vast majority of the public would have no need for.
(And what are you reading where you've been promised 100TB drives? I have NEVER seen that, and certainly not 5 years ago.)
And it is kind of sad that you felt the need to turn this into a political bitchfest. - zeromancer, on 10/10/2007, -4/+5because they didn't want to be associated with yet another overrated doom game.
- Protoss, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I thought the same thing. I mean come on, one of them had to have thought of BioShock....
- WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1"and react with the electrons and oxygen at an air cathode. "
"That's an air cathode on the table."
"...But I don't see anything."
"Right." - JamesWilson, on 10/10/2007, -2/+3Did someone get told? Yes? OH SNAP!
- WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Di-lithium? Oh wait....
- rento, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Love this stuff
- endersadvocate, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1lengthy...
- WaterDragon, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I generate lots of energy every morning...but I use fresh coffee grounds, and boiling water.
- msgyrd, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Scales how?
I just imagine a cattle farm strapping this to the herd of cows, or the cartoonish hamsters in a running wheel. - DigEh, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Gee Cowboy ,I think saying ":all they did is" is a rather presumptuous comment. Are you going to back that up with some of the research you have done or is it that you are another armchair know-it-all with a brain full of negativism. Show some support!
- gkavalec, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1My dull pencil says a $400 block of these will charge a cell phone in a day.
For a one-time investment - and essentially zero fuel cost - that is a good deal. - inactive, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1@ diggydougie--->Why don't you use Goggle?
- vegasbright, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1Did someone just agree with a queef? Yah! Oh Snap!
- shinynew, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I'm glad i dont live in your insane world.
A war could cost more energy than it would provide.
In the end we will need to either harvest energy from plants or directly from the sun, everything else is just a short term fix. and solar power is simply a longer short term fix. - Nossie, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1"In the grand scheme of thngs, increasing storage space is not an exciting technological advancement. You can't compare that to the invention of electricity, or the lightbulb, or cars, or airplanes, or even the computer itself. It would be nthing more than a upigrdae."
Errrr that was partially my point? I was trying REALLY hard to find a good invention... Wifi ? but yeah we've not had anything truly revolutionary in years.
100TB discs have been promised since before Blu-ray and HD-DVD came out.... but if they sold those now they wont be able to sell you the 80TB discs in 5 years or so :P
What part of this is a political bitchfest?
1. I dont live in the USA
2. technology ALWAYS advances faster during wartime
3. firing missiles at cavemen with sticks is NOT War!
NEXT! - JamesWilson, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1I was agreeing with zeromancer
- diggydougie, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1So why not post the instructions on how to make one?
- cranium, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1It's amazing that in spite of the accelerating pace of innovation, mostly at the hands of private enterprise, some people still somehow manage to think that business stifles innovation. It's pretty obvious that your politics are screwing up your perceptions.
- shinynew, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1posting it twice wont help whatsoever.
- cranium, on 10/10/2007, -0/+1It's in mass production and commercially available in Japan. I've seriously got to party with those guys some time!
- Nossie, on 10/10/2007, -3/+3the sad fact is that although everyone talks about new technology in this 'exciting time to be alive'
when was the last time we actually had any? the cd? flash memory?
wake me up when the 100TB discs hit the shelves we've been told would happen for the last 5 years. Tech advance is artificial, just wait till we have another *REAL* war and technology will advance 10x than it has now... or till we've blown each other up.
Then we'll see real incentives to advance tech and not just gouge (sp??) consumers for older cheaper tech - rento, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1Because this research didn't give them motion sickness
- BadMonkeh, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0The original article is dugg (as should be) here: http://digg.com/tech_news/MIT_Students_Generate_El ...
- stonr2, on 10/10/2007, -0/+0Here is a vid of some more biofuel stuff from MIT dude David Berry
http://www.technologyreview.com/video/berry - inactive, on 10/29/2007, -1/+11. MIT recruits from the entire planet, not just USA.
2. If all people are useless, what does that make you?
3. I went there, consider myself pretty smart, and most other students kicked my ass academically.
4. 0 X 0 = 0 is not universal.
5. 2 + 2 = 5, for very large values of 2.
Ludites... /shakes head in sorrow/ - cranium, on 10/10/2007, -1/+1It's not linear like that. For example, 1800-1850 wasn't particularly awe-inspiring, but beat the hell out of 1700-1750.
We have come sooooo far in the last 50-60 years. Nuclear power, computation by automata, worldwide instantaneous information flow, most of what we now know about medical science. If we can provide essentially free energy to humanity and solve this C02 problem, we will literally open a new chapter of history. Oh, it would be a nice touch if we could figure out how to quit killing each other too... - cowsandmilk, on 10/10/2007, -1/+0it's a microbial fuel cell. General idea is that the cathode and anode are at different voltages on the electron transport chain. They didn't invent anything to do with that, all they did was use cheap materials...
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