Sony Runs Walkman Off Sugar-Based Bio Battery

StonyandCher writes "Sony has created a battery that produces electricity by breaking down sugar. The bio cell, which measures 39 millimeters cubed, delivers 50mW — a world record for such a cell, according to the company. 'In the bio cell sugar-digesting enzymes at the anode extract electrons and hydrogen ions from the glucose. The hydrogen ions pass through a membrane separator to the cathode where they absorb oxygen from the air to produce water as a byproduct. The electrons flow around the circuit outside the device producing the electricity needed to power it.'"

And just why won't this work for....

Laptops, cars etc?

Re:And just why won't this work for....

I can't wait for the Dell-Biobattery recall: My laptop popped, then began to digest itself on the desk.

Battery Product Name?

Sony refers to the sugar powered battery as a "Teenager".

Note: Purchasing teenagers is illegal in every country except Saudia Arabia and Nigeria.

Re:Battery Product Name?

Sony refers to the sugar powered battery as a "Teenager".

Yes, but it's been conclusively determined that you can't get any useful work out of a "Teenager" no matter how much sugar you feet it.

Now if you could harness the power that comes from the laser-like glare of contempt they constantly produce, you could probably power a small town...

Re:And just why won't this work for....

This battery can only output 50mW of power. A laptop could easily be consuming 50W when it's rather busy so to satisfy those requirements you would need a thousand of these cells. The article says that the cells are 39mm squared so that would take up a volume of over two cubic feet (somebody check my math on this). Similarly, the size you would need to power a car is also far too large.

Besides that though, the article makes no mention of how much power the battery actually holds, i.e. who cares if it can put out 50mW if it can only do it for two minutes.

Consistency?

One thing that I think would be a problem with "bio"-anything is consistency. What if it gets too hot, too cold, too humid, whatever? Do the biological components start behaving differently? Will the power output stay consistent under extreme vibration, etc?

but....

but...can they use sugartwin....

Sony batteries

The bio cell, which measures 39 millimeters cubed, delivers 50mW -- a world record for such a cell, according to the company.

The real question is, how much force does it create when it explodes?

Re:Sony batteries

will it blend? that would be sweet.

Re:Sony batteries

When Skynet became self aware at 2:14 AM EDT, August 29th, 2007, it was pissed off because it already had type 2 diabetes.

I propose this become the new standard in battery

No sony device will run on anything else, sure it is less efficient and probably won't work for very long, but sony brand SugarRay is now the only power you are allowed to use in your house. Old standards and new technology aren't important.

This just in HighDefinitionBatteries have been adopted by the biggest battery studios SugarRay is now dead.

Screw that

I can convert glucose to energy very efficiently, just give me a crank.

Re:Screw that

I can convert glucose to energy very efficiently, just give me a crank.

*sigh* Leave it to the Slashdot crowd to turn every story into a masturbation joke.

Re:Screw that

You have a twisted mind. I would *genuinely* appreciate the ability to power mobile devices with a foldable crank.

So I'm the one who turned it into a masturbation joke? Then my fall to the dark side is complete. Where's my red fucking lightsaber?

Re:Screw that

Right there in your hand.

Argh now I've fallen too.

Let me be the first to say...

Sweet!

Oh, great ...

After months an all-sugar diet, your Walkman becomes obese and sluggish, then you need to give it regular insulin injections, etc.

Big deal

...my body's been doing that for years.

ANOTHER FOOD-BASED FUEL CELL

I hate be a bit of a troll on this but Economists are already warning about food-based sources for fuel. Using grains to create ethanol could have a negative impact on the food market by driving up prices - especially for poor countries. Now Sony, in their infinate capatilsitic wisdom, have created a way to power a device, using suger. Nice. So in 15 years down the road, families around the world start starving so I can power my power-hungry laptop with a few pounds of suger, and dump a tonne of ehtanol into my gas guzzling HUMMER to get 10MPG. It's nice to know that my own personal power needs can determine whether or not the worlds poor can feed themselves. It's time to move away from this as an alternative power source because it's the 'right thing to do.'

Re:ANOTHER FOOD-BASED FUEL CELL

sugar doesn't have to come from grains, that's the stupid way. All plant cellulose is a bunch of sugars hooked end to end.

Food subsidies

If food prices are driven up, many poor countries are in fact going to benefit. With their very cheap labor, they could, at least in theory, produce cheap food and even export it. However, food subsidies in the developed world essentially kills their markets. Not only are they not able to export, they end up importing cheaper, subsidized food.

Food subsidies are *EVIL*

Not only are they not able to export, they end up importing cheaper, subsidized food.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6105790.st m [bbc.co.uk]

I'll just point out that the subsidised food actually drives the poor farmers out of business and reduces the amount of land that is then dedicated to farming within the poorest regions. The really nasty problems start when there's a subsequent drought and the remaining productive land doesn't produce enough food to feed the population. The result is famine, starvation, death and a greater need for aid.

Another problem appears when you have thousands of disaffected unemployed ex farmers just sitting around. Ideal supply of soldiers for anyone who decides they want to rebel against their desperate situation. Which obviously makes everything an order of magnitude worse. It's no coincidence that areas which receive lots of aid are areas which have problems with ongoing conflicts. It's a self reinforcing cycle.

Really, food subsidies are a form of economic warfare which attacks the poorest, most wretched, most defenceless people on the planet...

EU and US farmers are directly the cause of millions of deaths in the 3rd world.

 

The New Overlords

That's all we need: unkillable devices competing with humans for food. That can lull us to sleep or drive us crazy just by playing the same song over and over.

We'll go out not with a bang, or a whimper, but a "shuffle".

Re:The New Overlords

That's all we need: unkillable devices competing with humans for food. That can lull us to sleep or drive us crazy just by playing the same song over and over.

We'll go out not with a bang, or a whimper, but a "shuffle".

Do you not remember the slugbot story from a while back? Robotic slug killer crawls through the garden scooping up slugs to be digested and converted into robot fuel. Yeah, they started with slugs because we feel they're icky. They'll move on to cockroaches and nobody will care, then lobbyists and politicians and lawyers. And then when they come for the humans, there will be no one else to save us...unless we live upstairs. But God help us if they assimilate the design for that stair-climbing wheelchair.

Are these in use yet?

Someone who follows this field please reply- how are they doing with using these things to run implantable medical devices? Are they on the market, in human testing, in animal testing, in design, still just a glint in a venture capitalist's eye?

I know they're planning to have all sorts of implantable blood-powered sensors that send radio signals out to monitors. So, for one example, a diabetic can have a continuous blood glucose meter implanted in their wrist, which is powered by something like this, and sends wireless signals to a wrist-watch that gives continuous readings of blood glucose, bypassing all the finger-pricking blood tests. And the watch could then store that data and send it to the computer, where they can track it, graph it, correlate it with diet and exercise, recognize trends in the disease, etc. I'm sure there are endless cool potential medical uses. But I've been hearing about this for many years now, and while I'm sure I could Google up how it's going with a few hours of reading, would some knowledgeable Slashdot reader like to just cut to the chase and tell us where things stand?

Nano-confusion

Two friends chatting:

"I love your new iPod Nano"

"Oh, that's just the battery."

Considering...

What happened for example in Mexico with tortilla prices http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/6319093.stm [bbc.co.uk] and the threat to tequila production as well(!!), I wonder about the wisdom of converting our food supply to slake our thirst for energy. I would far better like to see alternative energy products like hydrogen fuel cells and the like rather than turning over arable land to energy production.

These batteries may have the potential to be good, but the impact on people, especially in the third world where food prices are a large obstacle has the potential to be nasty.

And where do hydrogen cells get the hydrogen?

Remember: Hydrogen fuel cells are just batteries in effect. They aren't a method for producing power. You have to have hydrogen gas to make them work and that doesn't occur in quantities such that we can just gather it. It must be separated from another compound, water for example. Ok, but that requires energy. Where does that energy come from?

Supposing that the biogenesis theory of fossil fuel production is correct (the classic theory, that says it comes from living things over long periods and as such is not renewable) we are going to run out of it at some point. Unless you think we should all go live in the wilderness without power (in which case I say you first) we need to find alternate energy sources. Biofuels may well be a good one.

Hydrogen isn't a solution by itself. We may start using it as a more efficient way to store and transport power, but to get it we need to get energy from somewhere.

Unless we are going to take the Luddite answer of saying we need to stop using technology that requires power (which will lead to millions, perhaps billions of deaths as we cannot sustain the current population on preindustrial means) then we have to look for alternate power sources. We can't stick our heads in the sand and just whine about problems. Any energy source will come with problems, that's just life. The problems have to be weighed against the benefits.

Also please remember: Biofuels are in their infancy. Maybe we should keep investing and working, see if we can't figure out ways to make it more efficient. Plants are pretty efficient little solar cells, when you get down to it, we just need to work on getting ones that we can then efficiently turn in to other forms of energy.

So...

So Sony is cool again, right?

Please put all "That's pretty sweet" jokes here.

Please put your "That's Sweet" jokes under this thread, and be sure to include your home address and the specific way you would like me to kill you.

Re:Please put all "That's pretty sweet" jokes here

That's Sweet!

1600 Pensylvania Avenue
Washington DC 20500

ask for "W"

Re:Please put all "That's pretty sweet" jokes here

Please put your "That's Sweet" jokes under this thread, and be sure to include your home address and the specific way you would like me to kill you.

234 Elm Street, Amityville, Florida. Heart attack after an orgy involving the entire swedish bikini team. Making this happen is an exercise left for the assassin. Oh, and "Sweet!"

sugar? we don't get sugar here...

Unfortunately, the American version will run off of high-fructose corn syrup.

also, there's an Obvious Simpsons Reference here which I am too lazy to make.

Bioreactor-cure for Diabetes?

They should try to make a self powered mini bioreactors which consume sugar from blood.

Imagining the potetial

I one day forsee this technology being paired with a highly efficient food processing machine, breaking down foods into their component sugars.

Turning your garbage, old moldy food, etc into your households electricity needs!

Homer's theory of Sugar Power

First you get the sugar, then you get the power, THEN you get the women!

Welcome

I for one, welcome our C12H22O11 overlords

Everything I needed to know I learned in 2nd grade

Who would think those lemon batteries would B the power source of the future.

Medical uses

I wonder if there's potential for medical uses? Like powering pacemakers or other internal electronics, or burning off excess glucose in type II diabetics, or just burning off glucose for weight control

Sony robot name:

I think Sony should name their humanoid robot in development "PlayMusic".

bah... old news

Sony have been "sugar" powered for years. How do you think all those execs get that idea that they are "top of the world" and got the "best products of all time ever" ideas? ... and all those ideas that we'll screw them customers with our proprietary products and they won't notice, they'll beg for more. MORE! **throw face in bag**

(Technical) Art Imitates Life

I think this reflects a trend that we're seeing more of lately: technology using materials and processes taken from biology. This shouldn't be too surprising, as biology is optimized for the particular physics and chemistry of our universe.

First a corn shortage, now sugar

The price of corn went up thanks to all these 'green' autos. Now the price of sugar is going to go up because of personal audio devices!

They need to concentrate on getting power out of byproducts like veggie diesel. Now gimme a walkman with a small diesel engine running a small generator and then I'll be happy. Granted i'll have to stand in one place because it'll be too heavy to carry. And my hands will stink after fueling. At least grease doesn't explode to readily.

Hey, here's a question. Would a Vegan drive a volkswagon that runs off of animal fat grease? What a delimma... it's already dead, and it would be 'green.' What about a car that runs off of roadkill. Ok, this is going to be modd'd offtopic ;)

Oblig Dell post

This just in, "Sony and Dell in sweet new deal that promises explosive new laptop experience!"

Thanks, Sony, you bastards.

Well, that's the end of free packets of sugar.

Solar energy

I think we have just found our ultracheap solar panels, Sugar Cane!

Mr. Fusion

I'm single, and food in the US is only sold in "family size" portions. That means 50% of the stuff I buy spoils or gets moldy before I have a chance to eat it. Today, this goes in the trash or garbage disposal. But once this sort of battery becomes common, we will just have sugar processors. Dump your moldy food in, and fuel cells come out for use in your phone, iPod, laptop, and whatever else.

It really is like the Mr. Fusion! Garbage powered devices!

And for the people saying this will lead to food shortages in poor countries: No, using food I would have otherwise thrown away is not going to affect them at all.

High Fructose Corn Syrup

So will the US version need to use high fructose corn syrup instead to avoid the crazy sugar industry restrictions?

made one in kindergarden myself

Psh, this is supposed to be news? I made one of these with an apple, two wires, and a digital clock in kindergarden.

The perfect biofuel?

For children, this means your kid can have his mini-toy robot run off sugar. So when it gets tired you just have to actually feed him with sugar, and ta-da!

But what's the efficiency of sugar? I found in a diet site the following data:

• 1 gram of carbohydrate (i.e. sugar) = 4 calories
• 1 gram of protein = 4 calories
• 1 gram of fat = 9 calories (this is equivalent to burning gasoline)
• 1 gram of alcohol = 7 calories

So sugar is very inefficiency compared to other fuels. But at least it's a start. In any case, this reminds me of the times where we had to depend on animals to do the heavy work. How did you recharge animals? With plants, of course! Maybe that should be our goal, to have all our machines running on biofuel, hence becoming carbon neutral.

No Way

these Sony people wanted to charge me USD 200 for a couple of noise-cancelling earbuds, in an official Sony Style store. How much will they try to charge me for these batteries ? no way!

Shame

Too bad the article fails to mention what these enzymes turn the sugar into. Ethanol?

Hey I know how to solve the battery (hic) recycling pro (hic) problem. Can I have your (hic) dead batteries?

Original Sony press release

Original Sony press release [sony.net] with video.

Walkman?

They create an innovative source of energy, and then demonstrate it by powering a Walkman?

When they get around to inventing Mr. Fusion, will they demonstrate how it can power a vaccuum tube radio?

Add a tag...

wontworkinspace

You may be stranded

because your batteries went dead but at least you can eat them till the rescue party arrives.

old skool?

Didn't the Egyptians figure this out like 3000 years ago?

Produces water as a byproduct?

"The hydrogen ions pass through a membrane separator to the cathode where they absorb oxygen from the air to produce water as a byproduct."

Great, I've got to either diaper it or take it for a bathroom break every once in a while?

I'm not gonna be impressed...

...until someone designs a battery that runs on grey goo (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gray_goo [wikipedia.org]).

The way I see it, that should really be practical in a few years.

Got Carbs?

Perfect complement to a low-carb diet. If you've been wondering what to do with all that Easter and Christmas candy you get but can't have anymore, well Sony has the solution. One Cadbury egg [wikipedia.org] can play several hundred hours of music.

Sony?

Chemist Dr. Shelley Minteer from St. Louis University developed the tech to extract power from sugar using a special membrane mimicking the process of living cells.

So either Sony licensed this or developed it in parallel.

http://www.cbc.ca/quirks/archives/06-07/mar31.html [www.cbc.ca]

whats voltage and amp hours?

they said 50mW but for how long until you have to refill it?

IIRC

sugar burns, so this fits right into Sony's tech.

Next version...

will get its power from old people's medicine.

Re:But does it...

Listen, we already have a bunch of stories on /. about the evils of DRM. On one of those stories, your comment would be redundant at best. Right now it's offtopic, stupid, attention-seeking _and_ redundant. Epic fail.