TechRepublic: It appears that Sony has developed a type of battery that generates electricity from sugar. This mirrors the biological process that happens in living organisms.
Initial tests cells were able to generate up to 50 milliwatts, which is enough electricity to give you music playback on a memory-based music player. Says Sony in a statement released in Japan, the output is the highest for a bio battery of this type.
According to Information Week: “The battery generates electricity through the use of enzymes that break down carbohydrates, which is essentially sugar. Sony has increased battery output by efficiently immobilizing enzymes and the electronic conduction materials, while retaining enzyme activity at the anode, an electrode through which positive electric current flows into a polarized device.”
The attraction of this bio battery would be that this promises an ecologically friendly device. This is because sugar is a naturally occurring energy source produced during photosynthesis. To highlight the point, Sony made the battery casing using vegetable-based plastic.
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