The contribution of slimy material in the floor generates energy-if you run over it, first appeared at the online magazine Basic Thinking. You can start the day well every morning via our newsletter update.
Energy from the floor? Researchers have developed a mucus that generates clean electricity when running over it. We explain to you how the substance works and where it could be used in the future.
“It is soft and stroking in his hands and feels like the mucus that play with the children.” This is the description of a new invention of the University of Guelph.
Researchers from the Canadian university have developed a transparent, mucus -like fabric that generates electricity in mechanical stress. A kind of gel that could supply buildings with electricity in the future – simply through the steps of passers -by.
Energy from the floor: This is how the mucus works
The professor of environmental technology, Dr. Erica Pensini happened to come across the promising gel – when she tried to capture Amine with the help of tensids in her research on water pollution.
“I became curious about the electrical properties of these molecular structures that interact with each other,” explains Pensini. Together with colleagues from the College of Engineering and Physical Science and the Department of Food Science, she published her study in Journal of Molecular Liquids.
The mucus consists of 90 percent of water and is supplemented by oleic acid and amino acids. The substance has a clear color and no smell. “The material is completely bio -based,” explains Pensini. If it is pressed or stretched, its gel consistency creates the so-called piezoelectric effect, which creates an electrical load.
This ability to change its shape makes it ideal for various applications, which the researchers discovered on the Canadian Light Source using a synchrotron – a particle accelerator.
Robot: mucus as the basis for synthetic skin
Due to its nature and functionality, there are many different possible uses for the mucus. So it could be incorporated into floor coverings and generate clean energy while people run over it. Green electricity would continuously be created in busy areas such as subway stations or gyms.
Installed in shoe soles, the material could provide information about the analysis of the gait image of a person. According to Pensini, it is also theoretically possible to use the substance as the basis for synthetic skin. For example, you could teach robots how much pressure you have to use to check the pulse of patients.
Substance heals wounds
Since the water content of the mucus is so large, it also offers potential in the area of first aid. Pensini tested the substance on her own hands to heal skin abrasions from climbing. The material is also suitable for the production of associations that actively promote healing.
If you manufacture an association that reinforces this electrical field, the healing could theoretically be faster. In this case, the association would be activated by our natural movements and our breathing.
Because the mucus in principle works like a sponge that gives water when pressing, the scientist can also imagine that the material could delete medication in the body in the future.
Imagine that the material assumes an output structure that contains a pharmaceutical substance, and when an electrical field is created, the structure changes to release the medication.
Energy from the floor: quantity still too low
As interesting as the possible uses are: Currently, the amount of electricity that the mucus can produce is still very low. How much energy the mucus can generate depends on how much you deform it, explains Pensini.
If you put a peas -sized lump together over half of its output length, you can win a few micro -mumbles. For comparison: With a commercially available AA battery, you could produce almost a million times more.
At the moment, the mucus generated energy does not yet be sufficient to compete with other technologies such as balcony power plants. However, the research team around Erica Pensini is still at the beginning. In the future, the team wants to investigate how structural changes increase efficiency.
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The contribution of slimy material in the floor generates energy – when you run over it, first appeared on Basic Thinking. Follow us too Google News and Flipboard Or subscribe to our update newsletter.
As a Tech Industry expert, I find the concept of using slime material in the floor to generate energy when it is run over to be quite innovative and intriguing. This type of technology could potentially revolutionize the way we think about energy generation and sustainability.
The idea of harnessing energy from something as simple as slime material is both fascinating and environmentally friendly. It could have numerous applications, such as in high-traffic areas like airports, train stations, or even busy city streets. By converting the kinetic energy from people walking or running over the slime material into electricity, we could potentially power nearby devices or even buildings.
However, there are also challenges and considerations to take into account. For instance, the efficiency of converting the kinetic energy into usable electricity, the durability and maintenance of the slime material, and the overall cost of implementing such a system on a larger scale.
Overall, I believe that the concept of using slime material in the floor to generate energy has great potential and could be a step towards a more sustainable future. It will be interesting to see how this technology develops and if it becomes a viable solution for energy generation in the future.
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