| Topic: |
Religions > Atheism |
| User: |
"stoney" |
| Date: |
04 Oct 2006 01:48:10 AM |
| Object: |
Engine on a chip drives laptops |
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Last Updated: Thursday, 28 September 2006, 10:46 GMT 11:46 UK
Engine on a chip drives laptops
It is one of the most hotly contested and closely watched areas of
research - how to provide the most efficient energy source for the
mobile devices we carry with us.
Batteries and fuel cells are established contenders to power laptops and
mobile phones, but now researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology (MIT) have come up with a novel approach to the power
conundrum - by building an engine on a chip.
Gas-turbine engines more normally power whole cities but MIT's Professor
Alan Epstein was determined that minuscule versions could be used to
"power a person".
Ten years on from having the brainwave, Professor Epstein believes the
microengine could give batteries a run for their money, offering 10
times the power of a battery of the same weight at the same price point.
"A laptop that will run for three hours on battery charge will run for
15 to 20 hours using the microengine and it should end up costing no
more than current batteries," said Professor Epstein.
He believes it could be available commercially within three to five
years.
Tiny scale
It has been a long road for Professor Epstein and his team of 50 other
staff and students.
"When I first told people that I wanted to build a gas-turbine the size
of a 50p piece they fell off their chairs laughing," he told the BBC
News website.
But with the experts needed to make his vision a reality just a stone's
throw from his office at MIT, it didn't take long to persuade them that
he wasn't joking.
"A few days later they would call back with a way to do things and then
they were hooked," he said.
So how exactly does one set about making a tiny fuel-burning engine? A
compressor, a combustion chamber and a spinning turbine are all
essential parts but obviously cannot be made in the conventional way on
such a tiny scale.
So the team had to use etched silicon. The resulting microengine is made
up of six silicon wafers piled on top of each other and bonded together.
To bring down costs, up to 100 components are made on one large wafer
and cut into individual units.
The process begins with a tiny combustion chamber where fuel and air mix
and burn at the melting point of steel. Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
Fun process
A mini-generator produces 10 watts of power and a tiny compressor raises
the pressure of air in preparation for combustion. The cooling process
is managed by sending the compression air around the outside of the
combustor.
Separately it has been proved that all the parts work so the challenge
now is to test an integrated chip.
According to Professor Epstein, this should be done by the end of this
year but it won't be easy.
Each microengine will be on a single piece of silicon so there is no
margin for error. One tiny mistake in a single component would mean
starting from scratch, and if anything needs to be changed, the whole
design process would be back to the drawing board.
The journey so far has been "an astonishing amount of fun", said
Professor Epstein, although, as with many projects, threw up surprising
problems.
"What we thought was going to be hard, wasn't, and the things we hadn't
thought about were the biggest problems," he told the BBC News website.
"We thought the combustor would be one of the hardest things but in fact
it turned out to be the manufacturing of the bearings that was more
difficult," he said.
Steam-powered laptops?
While Professor Epstein has lived and breathed his project for the last
10 years, he is aware that there is plenty of competition around.
Batteries are improving all the time, while announcements about advances
in fuel-cell technology are regular and closer to commercial reality.
What technique wins out will ultimately be down to what consumers find
most satisfactory.
"The users don't care about what powers their laptop. Whether it is
chemistry or thermodynamics is a mere detail," he said.
The idea of engine-powered laptops may seem outlandish but research is
ongoing to put other types of engine on chips, according to Professor
Epstein.
As well as millimetre-scale combustion engines, there is also the
possibility of laptops powered by steam engine - which would perhaps be
the ultimate collision between old and new technologies.
/end
--
Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a plethora of splinters.
.
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| User: "J Forbes" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
04 Oct 2006 02:24:26 AM |
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stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
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| User: "stoney" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
08 Oct 2006 09:40:02 PM |
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On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm> wrote
in alt.atheism
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Yes, it would be.
--
Fundies and trolls are cordially invited to
shove a wooden cross up their arses and rotate
at a high rate of speed. I trust you'll
be 'blessed' with a plethora of splinters.
.
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| User: "Ben Kaufman" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
04 Oct 2006 03:53:23 AM |
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On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm> wrote:
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
It may not be a mistake. Such tiny things have very little mass.
Ben
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| User: "DaveJr" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
04 Oct 2006 04:31:03 AM |
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"Ben Kaufman" <spaXm-mXe-anXd-paXy-5000-dollars@pobox.com> wrote in
message news:dvb6i2dh5pdav6in69ji1iipebvlgpma5r@4ax.com...
On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm>
wrote:
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
It may not be a mistake. Such tiny things have very little mass.
Ben
And no memory, or running low. I like the idea.
.
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| User: "johac" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
04 Oct 2006 06:00:01 AM |
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In article <45233a4e$0$10298$815e3792@news.qwest.net>,
"DaveJr" <davesbrain@qwest.net> wrote:
"Ben Kaufman" <spaXm-mXe-anXd-paXy-5000-dollars@pobox.com> wrote in
message news:dvb6i2dh5pdav6in69ji1iipebvlgpma5r@4ax.com...
On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm>
wrote:
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
It may not be a mistake. Such tiny things have very little mass.
Ben
And no memory, or running low. I like the idea.
It does sound great, if it works. I didn't see what fuel they used.
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
Contact - Throw a .net over the .com
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| User: "Ben Kaufman" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
04 Oct 2006 12:05:22 PM |
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On Tue, 03 Oct 2006 23:00:01 -0700, johac <jhachmann@sbcglobal.com> wrote:
In article <45233a4e$0$10298$815e3792@news.qwest.net>,
"DaveJr" <davesbrain@qwest.net> wrote:
"Ben Kaufman" <spaXm-mXe-anXd-paXy-5000-dollars@pobox.com> wrote in
message news:dvb6i2dh5pdav6in69ji1iipebvlgpma5r@4ax.com...
On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm>
wrote:
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
It may not be a mistake. Such tiny things have very little mass.
Ben
And no memory, or running low. I like the idea.
It does sound great, if it works. I didn't see what fuel they used.
It runs best with a complex oil found only in olives that grow in Iran. :-)
Ben
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| User: "johac" |
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| Title: Re: Engine on a chip drives laptops |
05 Oct 2006 04:50:08 AM |
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In article <bm87i2ddiodje910upjn08ihn8qa0dgjts@4ax.com>,
Ben Kaufman <spaXm-mXe-anXd-paXy-5000-dollars@pobox.com> wrote:
On Tue, 03 Oct 2006 23:00:01 -0700, johac <jhachmann@sbcglobal.com> wrote:
In article <45233a4e$0$10298$815e3792@news.qwest.net>,
"DaveJr" <davesbrain@qwest.net> wrote:
"Ben Kaufman" <spaXm-mXe-anXd-paXy-5000-dollars@pobox.com> wrote in
message news:dvb6i2dh5pdav6in69ji1iipebvlgpma5r@4ax.com...
On 3 Oct 2006 19:24:26 -0700, "J Forbes" <jforbspam@fastmail.fm>
wrote:
stoney wrote:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/5386004.stm
Turbine blades spin at 20,000
revolutions per second.
that's fast! 1.2 million rpm
oh, it's probably a mistake?
Jim
It may not be a mistake. Such tiny things have very little mass.
Ben
And no memory, or running low. I like the idea.
It does sound great, if it works. I didn't see what fuel they used.
It runs best with a complex oil found only in olives that grow in Iran. :-)
Ben
Or grease from a rare species of Yak found only in N. Korea. :-)
--
John Hachmann aa #1782
"Those who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities"
-Voltaire
Contact - Throw a .net over the .com
.
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