I really feel the tech around batteries needs particular focus, as the one thing computing technology seems to lag on is battery life - I dream of a time where I can charge my laptop once a year and not have to worry about it otherwise.
Perhaps 3D printing of batteries will offer easier iteration on new ideas?
Battery life only sort of bugs me, the real issue I have with modern batteries is longevity.
Once a typical Li-ion battery is a few years old it might as well be worthless, it will hold only a fraction of the original charge it could when it was new and that amount will continue to drop over time. If we could build batteries with even 80% of the storage density of Li-ion but would retain 90% of that capacity over 10 years I'd be pretty happy.
The Lewis lab's main contribution here is the scale and precision of 3D printing. These batteries are not immediately useful (although there are sensors and other electronics that are an order of magnitude smaller than the batteries that power them, and in the future micro-scale batteries could overall reduce the size of these electronics). They are not powerful or robust, but they are precisely assembled. This type of 3D printing will enable future miniaturization of electronics and be especially useful at the interface of electronics and biology. For instance, current 3D printers have resolution several orders of magnitude above the scale of features in tissues. Increasing the resolution of 3D printing enables tissue engineering at a scale similar to actual biological features. Batteries are just a flashy and potentially useful application of this fundamental printing technology.
I wonder how "sturdiness" scales. What happens when you drop or bang a battery with such tiny features? Obviously they are very weak, but they also have very little mass.
I generally count on HN to have someone with experience in any given field. Today I call on those with experience scaling structures into the larger micron ranges.
force from acceleration scales linearly with mass. mass, however, scales cubic with size: something at 1/10 scale is 1/1000 the mass.
surface scales square with scale (something at 1/10 scale has 1/100 surface or cross section surface)
with miniaturization with factor x you get 1/x^3 mass and 1/x^2 cross section surface. as a result stresses (Force/Surface) becomes 1/x less on a given surface for acceleration.
[+] [-] singular|12 years ago|reply
I really feel the tech around batteries needs particular focus, as the one thing computing technology seems to lag on is battery life - I dream of a time where I can charge my laptop once a year and not have to worry about it otherwise.
Perhaps 3D printing of batteries will offer easier iteration on new ideas?
[+] [-] InclinedPlane|12 years ago|reply
Once a typical Li-ion battery is a few years old it might as well be worthless, it will hold only a fraction of the original charge it could when it was new and that amount will continue to drop over time. If we could build batteries with even 80% of the storage density of Li-ion but would retain 90% of that capacity over 10 years I'd be pretty happy.
[+] [-] bane|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] daughart|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jws|12 years ago|reply
I generally count on HN to have someone with experience in any given field. Today I call on those with experience scaling structures into the larger micron ranges.
[+] [-] jmpe|12 years ago|reply
surface scales square with scale (something at 1/10 scale has 1/100 surface or cross section surface)
with miniaturization with factor x you get 1/x^3 mass and 1/x^2 cross section surface. as a result stresses (Force/Surface) becomes 1/x less on a given surface for acceleration.
(on mobile, edited a few times)
[+] [-] officialjunk|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hoylemd|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] TobbenTM|12 years ago|reply
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6807524
(Sorry)
[+] [-] Kliment|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jlas|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hpy_thksgvngzzz|12 years ago|reply
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