Stanford electrical engineer and biological implant mastermind, Ada Poon, has discovered a way of wirelessly transmitting power to tiny, rice-grain-sized implants that are deep within the human body. This could well be the breakthrough that finally allows for the creation of smaller pacemakers, body-wide sensor networks, and a new class of “electroceutical” devices that sit deep in the human brain and stimulate neurons directly, providing an alternative for drug-based therapies for depression, Alzheimer’s, and other neurological ailments.
Wireless power transmission is fantastic in theory — but in practice, due to some pesky laws of physics, the range of transmission is extremely limited. Yes, you can now charge your phone by putting it on a wireless power transfer plate, but that plate still needs to be plugged into the wall, and — more importantly — you still have to remember to put your phone on the plate. What would really make wireless power transmission (WPT) useful is if you could power a device that’s still in your hands or pocket. By using metamaterials, Duke University might have discovered a way of doing just that.
South Korea has rolled out the world’s first road-powered electric vehicle network. The network consists of special roads that have electrical cables buried just below the surface, which wirelessly transfer energy to electric vehicles via magnetic resonance. Road-powered electric vehicles are exciting because they only require small batteries, significantly reducing their overall weight and thus their energy consumption. There’s also the small fact that, with an electrified roadway, you never have to plug your vehicle in to recharge it, removing most of the risk and range anxiety associated with electric vehicles (EVs).
A German student has built an electromagnetic harvester that recharges an AA battery by soaking up ambient, environmental radiation. These harvesters can gather free electricity from just about anything, including overhead power lines, coffee machines, refrigerators, or even the emissions from your WiFi router or smartphone.
The fact that over 200,000 people have downloaded one of the various “shake to charge” apps, now available from Google Play, indicates our willingness to suspend any form of practical reasoning in pursuit of the dream of wireless charging.
The University of Nebraska’s NIMBUS Lab has developed unmanned UAV quadcopters that can fly around and wirelessly recharge devices. Ostensibly these UAVs have the rather unromantic purpose of recharging remote sensors — but it also means that, in the future, you might be able to call out a quadcopter to recharge your mobile phone.
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