'Diamond-age' of power generation as nuclear batteries developed

phys.org ^ | 11/27/2016

[roadcat]

Sounds like Star Trek technology! In “The Voyage Home”, I think, didn’t Chekoff recharge their dilithium crystals for their ship by bathing them in radiation leakage on the U.S.S. Enterprise?

[wally_bert]

Plenty of radiation in space so a diamond based missile killing laser might happen after all.

[lafroste]

Now there is a fun way to dispose of nuc waste. Put it in little packages and sell it to the public! Brilliant.

[bigbob]

We were promised little beer cooler-sized nuke generators that would run our houses back in the 50s...I’m still waiting!

[editor-surveyor]

.
There’s nothing new about power generation by nuclear decay.

As far as I know it is illegal in the US.

[Ray76]

If power can be increased this would be revolutionary, a landmark in human history.

[editor-surveyor]

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Just like the fluoride in your drinking water.
.

[TexasGator]

This is new.

[Bayard]

So, possibly a thousands of years battery for perpetual low-energy applications.

That would be useful for places where a generator is difficult to support.

[Future Useless Eater]

Now there is a fun way to dispose of nuc waste. Put it in little packages and sell it to the public! Brilliant.

It's worked before. That is how Alcoa managed to keep from having its fluoride waste products (a hazardous byproduct of Aluminum manufacturing) kept off the hazardous-waste listings. They paid off an incoming Executive branch administration, and paid Carnegie Melon to do a study and "find" that it was actually healthy for you.

One of the very first official acts of the incoming administration was to herald this sludge was "good for you" and recommend it go into drinking water.

Now, Grand Rapids Michigan has the highest bone cancer rates in the country, which just happens to be one of the first cities in America to welcome this new finding and pollute their drinking water with the crap. Grand Rapids also happens to be a half-hour away from the Alcoa plant that funded the Carnegie study.

To this day, tons of "experts" will swear it is settled-science that fluoride is good for your teeth and bones. The reality is it makes both of them harder, but more brittle. like a sword made out of iron would be very hard, but it would shatter the first time it struck anything.

(Flouride likes to bond with bone almost as well as it bonds with Aluminum. And some theorize it holds Aluminum longer in the body that it would otherwise be held)

[wally_bert]

Thank you for the history lesson. I had no idea.

In a way Alcoa couldn’t wait for tomorrow.

It was a slogan from the 70s fantastic finishes football commercials.

[KarlInOhio]

Nuclear batteries? Can I get one for my Samsung phone?

[BenLurkin]

“Put on every zig!”

[TexasGator]

LOL.

[SamAdams76]

[meyer]

WANT!

[Spruce]

[Noumenon]

For great justice.

[headstamp 2]

Nuclear flashlight batteries on the horizon!